Yami Gautam has experienced failures but the actress has never feared being written off nor does she shy away from playing second fiddle.
Last seen as the lone female in an ensemble of male actors in Sarkar 3, Yami will now be seen in Batti Gul Meter Chalu. Yet again, she is not quite the lead actress. Instead, what might appear to the average movie-goer, the actress has ceded the lead girl’s role to Shraddha Kapoor, who gets to romance the hero.
Yami though is nonchalant. She believes she is on a strong turf. “The story may start wherever, but it finally boils down to a courtroom drama,” says Yami, who will be seen playing a lawyer who is fighting it out with Shahid Kapoor’s character.
Despite not having a hero to do a song and dance routine with, Yami believes she is anything but playing second fiddle. “I know my styling is black and white and my look will not be of blow-dried hair. But I wanted this. But when will I experiment if not now? This comes from a sense of security…” she asserts.
Of course, she is not giving up on her heroine ambitions. “I can do that in another film. But I wanted to do this. She (her character in Batti Gul) is a very strong independent girl, who is fighting for what she believes in. I had never done something like this and I grabbed this opportunity,” says the actress.
Yami was studying law with an aspiration to crack the UPSC before the movie bug got better of her. Her association with the law hence is not new, though it was for the movie that she finally landed in a court.
“I was pursuing law after school. I was doing my honours in it from Panjab University because I wanted to appear for UPSC. My father has asked me not to talk about this as I never completed it neither did I become an IAS officer. I was among the top ten rankers in the university. So that is a minor connection. But after that, it was this film that I got to visit the court for. We have family friends who are lawyers. This is one place you don’t want to go. I went to Bombay High Court, just as an exercise for Batti Gul, but I am sure it is a very different feeling when you have to end up in a court,” she said.
Yami is now waiting for public reaction. “This is the first time I am playing a lawyer and this is the first time I am speaking so much Hindi!” she said.
