Stardom, Here She Comes!

With Gangs of Wasseypur, this lady stepped on the right rungs of the ladder to success. She may have gone missing on-screen post Badlapur. But, after swimming in milk for such a long time, she has finally reached the cream, and it looks like HUMA QURESHI has no plans to evaporate anytime soon.

- Rinaldo D’Souza

Jolly LLB 2 was your first film with a superstar. Why did it take you so long to get a film with a biggie?

I don’t know, how does one go about this? I debuted in 2012 with Gangs of Wasseypur and it didn’t have any big actors at that time. Today, touch wood, everyone is doing quite well. I don’t socialise and don’t know how it’s done. I do films because I like them. My first few films were where somebody called me and said I want to work with you and that they like my work. I was grateful to have done this film with Akshay Kumar, but this was never planned.

You are also a part of Viceroy’s House. How was it working with Gurinder Chadha?

Viceroy’s House is a very special film, based on the partitioning of India, the last few months before India got her independence. In 1947, the last Viceroys come to India, Nehru, Jinnah, and everyone discuss how India is to be cut out. It revolves around how the first Government is to be formed. In that house, which was then called the Viceroy’s House, there’s a love story between a Hindu servant and a Muslim translator. I was very excited to work with Gurinder Chadha because firstly, she is a Punjabi, a British citizen and a woman, and the fact that she was making a film on the partitioning. I was like, how does the math add up? Because she is half-Indian and half-British, and she wants to make a film on the partitioning. Which is an Indo- British film. So what point of view would she have? You can’t limit yourself to a single point of view. To give her credit, she has given a very balanced point of view on what really happened. It was a film I was really proud of.

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