Dimple Kapadia to act in Hollywood film
By Dinesh Kamath
Veteran Indian actress Dimple
Kapadia will act in a Christopher Nolan film. The National Award-winning
actress, who has been a part of showbiz since 1973, was initially hesitant to
take on the role.
Mumbai-based talent manager Purvi Lavingia
Vats, pitched Dimple for the part and things fell into place. While the
prospect of working with Christopher Nolan sounded very exciting, she was a bit
hesitant in the beginning as there was not much information on the role. She
still sent footage of her work to the casting office and they really liked what
they saw. After a more detailed brief was sent, she then decided to audition. The
casting director was then flown from Los Angeles to Mumbai and he and Nolan met
her. The rest was history. They found Dimple the perfect fit.
On the Indian screens, Dimple had
become an overnight star with "Bobby" in 1973, but turned her back on
stardom to marry Rajesh Khanna, Bollywood's first superstar. After a decade of
absence, she returned with "Saagar", and then went on to prove her
mettle in "Aitbaar", "Arjun", "Rama Lakhan",
"Batwara", "Kaash", "Rudaali" and
"Lekin".
"Dil Chahta Hai",
"Luck by Chance", "What The Fish" and "Finding
Fanny" are some of the offbeat films Dimple chose after 2000. She was last
seen on the big screen in "Welcome Back".
Nolan, by no means, is regular for
an Indian film actor. Plus, a part of the film will also be shot in India,
where a part of his movie "The Dark Knight Rises" was filmed. The
shoot is likely to take place in August or September. Warner Bros. Pictures are
aiming to release it in theatres worldwide on July 17, 2020.
The probability of an actor from
India getting cast in Hollywood for a non-Indian part is very less. The chances
of an actor booking a role as an Indian character is much higher. Vats, who has
been a talent manager for the past 7 years, wants to work with talent from
India and bridge the gap in Hollywood.
The nature and size of the role
notwithstanding, Kapadia’s foray into Hollywood with a Nolan film was regarded
as big news in the Indian film industry.
While Kapadia herself has yet to
open up about the role, her manager explained how Nolan and co chose her for
the film. Apparently Nolan saw some footage of Kapadia’s work which left him
quite impressed. Kapadia then had an audition tape shot and sent to the
director and his team through her manager, which further convinced Nolan that
she was right for the part. The auditioning experience was kind of a new thing
for Dimple, having never given auditions previously. Her manager sat her down
and talked her into the process, explaining how important it is in Hollywood
productions to help the studios assess talent.
Kapadia’s casting probably stemmed
from Nolan’s decision to shoot at least some sequences of Tenet in India.
Together, the movie should be looking at India as a sizeable market and coupled
with Nolan’s visit to the country last year, should bode well for Tenet‘s
box-office performance in India already.
"Tenet" is Nolan's
follow-up to his Oscar-nominated war drama "Dunkirk" and besides
Kapadia will feature Robert Pattinson, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Kenneth Branagh,
Clemence Poesy, Michael Caine, John David Washington and Elizabeth Debicki in
the film.
The action film will be filmed
across seven countries. Kapadia's elder daughter Twinkle took to Twitter to
congratulate her on her Hollywood debut. "Congratulations mother! So so
proud of you! You are truly amazing and you set an example for all of us that
age is not an obstacle in the path of ability and talent #Hurrah," Twinkle
wrote on Twitter.
Back home in India, Kapadia has
received acclaim for her performances in films such as "Rudaali",
which earned her a National Film Award for Best Actress, "Gardish",
"Krantiveer", "Dil Chahta Hai", "Being Cyrus",
"Finding Fanny" and others.
The 61-year-old actor, who married
superstar Rajesh Khanna, was last seen in Anees Bazmee's 2015 film
"Welcome Back".
Dimple Kapadia was launched by Raj
Kapoor at age 16, playing the title role in his teen romance Bobby (1973). In
that same year she married Indian actor Rajesh Khanna and retired from acting.
Kapadia returned to the film industry in 1984, following her separation from
Khanna. One of her films of that period was the drama Saagar (1985). Both Bobby
and Saagar won her the Filmfare Award for Best Actress. She went on to
establish herself as one of the leading actresses of Hindi cinema in the 1980s.
Initially recognised as a national
sex symbol, Kapadia was keen to avoid being stereotyped and expand her range of
acting roles. She subsequently took on more serious parts in a range of film
genres, from mainstream to parallel cinema, and received acclaim for her
performances in such films as Kaash (1987), Drishti (1990), Lekin... (1990),
and Rudaali (1993), which earned her a National Film Award for Best Actress and
a Filmfare Critics Award for Best Actress. She followed with supporting roles
in Gardish (1993) and Krantiveer (1994), the latter of which garnered her a
fourth Filmfare Award.
Kapadia continued working
infrequently through the 1990s and the 2000s. She played a minor part in Dil
Chahta Hai (2001) and was noted for her portrayal of the title role in the
American production Leela (2002). Some of her later film credits include
leading roles in Hum Kaun Hai? (2004), Pyaar Mein Twist (2005), Phir Kabhi
(2008) and Tum Milo Toh Sahi (2010), and supporting roles in Being Cyrus
(2005), Luck by Chance (2009), Dabangg (2010), Cocktail (2012) and Finding
Fanny (2014). Kapadia is the mother of Twinkle Khanna and Rinke Khanna, both
former actresses.
When Kapadia made her comeback to
movies, she faced constant comparison to her Bobby days. According to Jyotika
Virdi, author of the book The Cinematic Imagination, Kapadia trajectory is
"different from that of any female Hindi film star", and she
"turned every disadvantage to her advantage." Virdi mentioned
Kapadia's forthright manner as having a major contribution to her career:
"Speaking candidly to the press, she and the reporters plotted her life's
narrative from the innocent teenager snared into an impossible marriage to the
emergence of a mature 'woman with experience.'" Virdi also noted Kapadia
for "fighting her way to the top, preferring to perform roles she
described as serious and exacting rather than flippant and unchallenging,"
calling her parts in Aitbaar (1985), Kaash (1987) and Drishti (1990) as roles
"where she drew from the well of her own experience."
Kapadia is known for her assertive
and moody nature; during the making of Janbaaz (1986), director Feroz Khan
remarked, "No other girl has so much of pent-up aggression."
Journalist Bhawana Somaaya, who conducted a series of interviews with her
during the 1980s, stated, "She's a strange bundle of contradictions. Her
moods change in a jiffy." According to some critics, this approach has
sometimes been at the cost of professional opportunities as "her
unpredictable nature and moods have distanced many well wishers". In reply
to this, she said, "I am moody by nature. But I have never consciously
hurt anyone." According to Shobha Dé, Kapadia "hates being 'surveyed'
and she finds herself in that unenviable situation all the time."
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