Madhur Bhandarkar with Konkona Sen Sharma

When you were making Page 3, did you plan to make a trilogy or was the idea born out of the success of the film?

No, I always had the trilogy in mind but yes, success does supplement ideas. When I was researching for Page 3, I had met a lot of corporate people. It was then that their way of life interested me. I had decided that I would make a film on boardroom politics and open up this world to everyone. That became Corporate. Then later, of course, I thought of Signal, about the many lives associated with traffic signals in Mumbai.

What was it about the corporate life that attracted you?

When two businessmen got chatting, I would stand there and not understand a single word they said. I have never belonged to this corporate world, having come from a very middle-class family. So, I found everything about them very new, very interesting. Their body language, their lingo? it was absolutely different from the kind of people we all get to meet. Also the fact that nobody?s made a full-fledged film on the corporate world in India.

But does the corporate culture provide the backdrop or is the story strung together with boardroom politics?

The basic premise is the corporate world but there is also an intense relationship between the characters played by Kay Kay Menon and Bipasha Basu. There has to be a human angle to the story, otherwise it would be difficult for audiences to identify with the characters. The modus operandi shown in the film, however, is strictly from the corporate world.

The child molestation in Chandni Bar, the paedophile in Page 3... you have gone for shock endings in both your acclaimed films. Is that a deliberate ploy to disturb audiences?

Not at all. I have only treated the subjects in the way they demanded. What elements go into a film depend entirely on the subject I am dealing with. Even in Satta, which wasn?t seen much during its release, people said how murky politics can get. All the incidents that I show are mostly inspired by newspapers clippings. I just show them.

As with the trilogies of good directors, will there be some leitmotif or recurrent image in Page 3, Corporate and Signal?

The subjects may be all different but I am the same maker. Of course there will be images that will remind you of another film that I made. See, every time I shoot a bar scene, people feel that I am making Chandni Bar, every time I shoot a political scene, people feel I am making Satta. There is a sequence in Corporate where five people are drinking in a bar. Now although the backdrop may be different, the images are bound to be similar because I am the same person behind the camera. That?s not conscious. But yes, in Signal, which is the third film of the trilogy, there will be references to Page 3 and Corporate.

Has Bipasha been able to deliver as a corporate honcho?

When I cast Bipasha in Corporate, lots of eyebrows were raised. She has been associated with dancing roles and item songs. But when I do my casting, I do it as per my characters. I have given Bipasha a completely different look in Corporate and even changed her dialogue pattern. Once people see her as Nishigandha Dasgupta, they will forget the Bipasha of Jism and No Entry. She will surely get a new image and perspective.

For the male lead you have gone for someone non-mainstream like Kay Kay...

People did tell me that after Page 3 I could have gone for any big actor. But Kay Kay fits the character in my film. Even for Signal, I went for Kunal Khemu because he looks like a guy on the streets. I am not a commercial film-maker, I am an experimental director. I did make Aan but that failed miserably and my friends and fans just ripped me apart. So I am not trying that again.

Apart from Kunal, you have gone back to your Page 3 star Konkona for Signal...

Yes, she was very reluctant to play the role of the prostitute in the film but I was very confident. And she has done a fabulous job and I am sure this will break her Page 3 image, which was reserved and sober. Here she is an extrovert and very chatty.

Finally, do you see Corporate and Signal being able to appeal to all like Page 3?

My first target is the multiplex audience but then I have kept elements for the masses too. If in Page 3 I got the viewpoints of drivers, in Corporate you will get to hear the voices of peons and bodyguards.