When we dial National-award winning costume designer Payal Saluja on June 13, she sounds happy. It’s been a few hours that Abhishek Chaubey’s Udta Punjab has got the green signal to be screened at the theatres with just one cut.
“When Abhishek had first sent me the script, I could not finish it at one go. I cried in between, many times. That’s the depth of Udta Punjab,” says Payal who completes a hat-trick of films with Abhishek after Ishqiya and Dedh Ishqiya. How would she describe the overall look of the film? “There is a greyness in the film,” says Payal, decoding the four central looks for t2...  
 

Alia Bhatt: 
The outsider

The first question I asked Abhishek was who’s playing Alia’s character. This was my first project with Alia but I knew she was experimental. 

When characters like this are sketched, it is a very stereotypical approach that is followed, which I didn’t want to do. We played with the texture of her skin. Alia did not come with her team. The kind of trust she showed in the director and me brought out the best. 

Everything was custom-made for her. It looks like it’s off the racks and we had to create anti-fit, rough-looking clothes, very real. After making the clothes, there was an extended ageing process. A little bit of kajal or bindi is all that she can afford. Her transformation was so real that there was a scene where she gets off the bus, but nobody recognised her.
People kept looking for Alia Bhatt! Standing there the kind of happiness I felt, you cannot define it. 

Shahid Kapoor’s Tommy Singh 
Tommy is a mix of a pop and a rock star. He is a talented star who is layered with his negative side. His core is lovable. He is someone who would have travelled the world. So, he has a European influence to him, yet he is rooted in Punjab. When I read the script and had the initial discussions with Abhishek and Shahid, all of us were on the same page. We knew he had to be real because the character is out there... we were careful never to go overboard. Both Abhishek and Shahid believe in being understated. 

Tommy sports 14 tattoos. They are not mindless. We went through his mental process. The tattoos are closest to his heart. One of the tattoos is Gabru, which is what people know him as. That’s tattooed in a mix of English and Hindi on his knuckles. The extended wings say that he is born to fly. That is the mental make-up of Tommy. He is flying high. That is also his aspiration... to fly high... and somewhere along the line we see what happens to him. The pistol with a heart-shaped trigger is the raunchy side of Tommy. 

For his hair, I went through a lot of images of a lot of international stars.  We experimented a lot. We decided to do longer hair and then went ahead with green streaks. Tommy is bold enough to carry green. 

The long hair is the slightly unkempt side of Tommy. We went shorter on the sides and longer on the crown. We thought of doing a Mohawk, but then we realised that not many people would relate to that. Now his locks are the talk of the town!
Tommy is lean. Shahid worked out for almost three months.... I think we managed to strike a balance where people can relate to him. 

You will see him in an accentuated neutral colour scheme. I have used a lot of blacks, whites and greys and used one colour or an accent to enhance it. Most of the time, Tommy is in black and white, with red or blue or green thrown in. We kept the clothes minimal. We gave these long T-shirts with side zippers. There is a hint of Indian art to it also. He wears these drop-crotch pants. He is someone who would always want to wear comfortable clothing and he would never wear something off the racks. We travelled to two countries to put his look together, but not a single piece was used like it was bought. A lot of creativity went in where we chopped off every single piece. I am someone who always keeps a tailor handy!

With Shahid what is nice is that he doesn’t come with any preconceived notion. He tries to feel his clothing on an emotional level. He is bold. He is not scared of losing his personality in the character. Sometimes we didn’t know if it was Shahid or Tommy! (Laughs)

Kareena Kapoor’s Preet Sahani

Preet was another difficult character for me to explore. Kareena Kapoor looks glamorous in anything. My challenge was to make her look de-glam. I was awed by her spotless complexion. 

Since this film is set in Punjab, we went to Amritsar, Tarn Taran Sahib and other places and clicked hundreds of pictures. All the girls in Punjab like to sport this puffed hairstyle. And, I don’t think any Punjabi girl will not have a set of baalis. We kept her colours pastel and soft. Ballerina shoes are popular in Punjab. We’ve given those too. Women in Punjab also wear sports shoes with salwar kameez. It’s functional. We also gave Kareena sleeveless cardigans, called kotis. I am a Punjabi myself and it is a tradition where grandmothers would make it for the younger girls in the family. They have these front pockets.... Kareena plays a doctor. Very minimal kajal and lip balm are what she wears. 


Diljit Dosanjh’s Sartaj Singh 
He plays a sub-inspector and our idea was to make him look like any man walking the streets of Punjab. We have done these pleated pants for him. He wears basic white sneakers.