‘SAYING NO TO A FILM BREAKS MY HEART’
Priyanka has her hands full with projects, but the actor says it’s better than having no work at all
Actor Priyanka Chopra says that she hates saying no to projects which she feels strongly about. The actor, who is also shooting for her American show Quantico while shooting for her Bollywood films simultaneously, says that this doesn’t allow her to take up much here.
“It’s my choice that I have two active careers in two different continents. I want to balance it out and not choose between either and though it does get overwhelming at times, it’s a good problem to have. It’s better than having no work. But my heart breaks when I have to say no to films that I want to do, because I am a greedy actor,” she says.
Priyanka, who played the role of Peshwa Bajirao’s first wife, Kashibai, in her latest film Bajirao Mastani and plays an FBI agent in Quantico, says that while there were times when she was simultaneously shooting for both projects, she didn’t find it very difficult to switch roles. “I am not that kind of an actor. I am a spontaneous one and I switch in and out of my characters and prep enough to know them well. There are different schools of acting. They are all wonderful and correct. But I taught myself my job and the process is very different. My process happens after I wear my costume. That’s when I become the character that I am. Before that I am only Priyanka,” says the actor, who won the People’s Choice Award for Quantico as well as several awards for her latest film Bajirao Mastani.
While actors talk about cutting themselves off from the rest of the world while preparing for their roles, Priyanka doesn’t believe in that. “I am not someone who thinks about the character and lives in it. Then I can’t be spontaneous on the set. Then I am too prepared. It becomes robotic. I just have conversations with my director about the emotions of the character, what is she thinking and feeling. I can never repeat the same take. In between action and cut, whatever comes to me as my character, gets printed. I am conventional so it helps me to switch in and out,” she says.