THE RELENTLESS - TAAPSEE PANNU

With a filmography that has only set the wonder woman standards of narratives and stories, actor Taapsee Pannu goes into details of her journey, one that’s made of a ladder with every step taking her a notch higher, and about quarantine with a routine

- SAMREEN TUNGEKAR

When you look at Amrita, the calm woman, sitting through her divorce negotiations in a room where her husband who had slapped her is trying to prove that she’s manic in Thappad, do you go back to think about the young, shy girl who made her Bollywood debut with three other actors, in a David Dhawan film called Chashme Badoor? It’s been quite a climb, and quite the path — as Bollywood always is — even when an actor, who is 10 films old in the South, joins the bandwagon but isn’t a part of any of their camps. She came, she set up her own camp, and she thrives.

A lot of what Pannu brings on screens reflects in her instincts, in her choices. And if you have been noticed for your performance in a film when the actor talking to you on screen is Amitabh Bachchan, you clearly are making the right choices. But what was the idea behind making a debut with a David Dhawan film when this is the calibre you possess, I wonder out loud to her on the phone, as we start this interview. “I stopped making plans long before because I realised whatever plans I make never happen. So there was no strategy behind the kind of film I wanted to debut with. I did get a few offers before, but I didn’t know the directors...I knew who David Sir was. I have grown up watching his films, and he’s one of the few directors who has his own audience. I wanted to do his film because he has his own audience, and it was a new experience for him too, to work with such a young crop of actors. It became a very tempting opportunity for me,” she says.