Hindustan Times (Lucknow) - Hindustan Times (Lucknow) - Live
LOVE BY CHANCE
Qarib Qarib Singlle actors Irrfan and Parvathy gave an insight into what modern relationships look like today
It was during the shooting of the film that I started putting myself out there again. PARVATHY, ACTOR We get a certain kind of conditioning from the society, 90% of people take those norms seriously... They stop exploring. IRRFAN, ACTOR
With his new found love for the romantic genre, Irrfan is on an experimental spree and his latest release Qarib Qarib Singlee deals with online dating.
His co-star Parvathy, a Malayalam actress, who makes her debut with the film says that her character of Jaya was pretty close to what she is in real life. The lead actors discussed life, romance, relationships and more when they visited the Hindustan Times office.
Irrfan, did you take up this role to change the image that people have of you?
Irrfan: No, it is just what you need at that time. If you have been doing certain kind of films, you feel the need to do something different. Being an actor, the most important thing is to share what is happening inside you, around you and what concerns you. Love is a major thing in my life and it has changed me a lot; I understood life because of that. You learn how it can flourish you and cleanse you. When you start understanding and experiencing that then you want to share it. You tend to learn about love through cinema when you are young and that affects you, but then it is not the same in real life.
Are you an expressive person when it comes to love?
Irrfan: No I am not. I am expressive when I realise that we have formed an equation, not before that.
Parvathy, how close are you to your character in the film?
Parvathy: I am pretty close to Jaya. There are a lot of tags and they don’t make sense to me. I was in a long distance relationship, which had just ended, and the idea that you can fall in love again was pretty unsettling for me. You have to be really brave enough to put yourself out there. I was tired because I didn’t want to start from the scratch again, so I started stopping myself from expressing. It was during the shooting of the film that I started putting myself out there again. It was very cathartic. The best thing about my job is that my characters teach me so much. It happened to me that while shooting the film, I also started liking someone but I was so scared to confess. My friend said that the moment you start worrying about what will happen, it is not healthy. So I started using that funda and it is still going strong. It does not matter how long you love but how well you love.
Do you feel this movie will drop the tags and inhibitions that we live with?
Irrfan: We get a certain kind of conditioning from the society, 90% of people take those norms seriously and they end up living the life that they would not have live ideally. They stop exploring; they do what they are told. We have to understand we are live beings; everything that is told to us is dead unless we experience them ourselves. We make a general truth about society and try to push that truth on society. Everybody has to find their own truth.
Since the film is about online dating. What is your take on that?
Irrfan: I know for a fact that if there is anything new in the market, I can’t use it. I can’t put my picture. I had tried once, but I failed. I think these are fantastic things, but they should have come sooner. In our society, I don’t think 90% of women have experienced orgasms. It is the truth but people will say ‘How can you talk about this?’. I feel all these apps will open possibilities. I have friends who have more than one boyfriend and that is because they want to explore. Who are you to tell them what to do? It is their body and it is their choice. If you can’t take it then leave.
This is your second film with Sutapa (Sikdar, his wife who is also the producer). Is it easy working with someone who you know so closely, or is it difficult?
Irrfan: Sutupa and I worked in a series but there our relation was different. She was the writer and I was the actor, and we used to have a lot of fights as she used to write a lot. Then she stopped writing and got bored of it. She is a creative person and is very unconventional; you can’t box her in a set of ideas. I used to see a lot of locked up energy in her and a lot of anxiety. This film just fell in our lap. She told me certain aspects of the film that I couldn’t see. Now, I feel I have seen a new Sutapa. She needs creative things in her life because this is what she loves.
Parvathy, why Hindi films after having a successful career in the South?
Parvathy: I have never understood the idea of a different industry. It is a bonus for me to learn a language that my character thinks in. initially people used to ask me, ‘Why did you leave Malayalam cinema and go to Tamil cinema?’ It was only because good films came from there. I will go where good cinema comes from. Irrfan is doing a Bangladeshi film. Hindi cinema has created so many brilliant films, which are content-driven as they should be, and now the term content-driven is coming back. I have always believed that if I am an artiste then I will create art no matter where I go. There is no strategy to anything, it is just a beautiful unpredictable journey. I keep thinking that any movie could be my last and it is fine, I will go to another avenue after this. Irrfan is a good example of this; he is someone who gets a high on living in the unpredictability of it. I am glad it happened.
Which image do you prefer — brooding or romantic?
Irrfan: I am kind of tired of the brooding image; there is so much romance inside me that I want to share it. It is all bottled up. It all comes from experience. You need to meet people. All those experiences change you, for example my first setback in love was so intense that I don’t think that I will ever be able to experience that again. It changed me for better and I thank god it happened. That experience really brought me out of my cocoon.