GHOSTS BUSTED
Some of Bollywood’s scariest spooks remain anonymous. After gruelling hours under masks and prosthetics, few even know it was them. A look at what it takes to play the bhoot
Would you want to hang from a harness all night? Be drenched in water and tied to a tree? Have cracked clay plastered on your face so you have to sip your food through a straw? If these sound like nightmares, you’re not far off. This is what it’s like for the actors playing ghosts and supernatural beings on screen. Perhaps the trickiest part is, they don’t even walk away with the fame. Sometimes, within the industry too, few people know it was them.
Did you know, for instance, that the sinister grandmother in Tumbbad was played by a 13-year-old boy? Mohammad Samad is notable for his age as well as his gender. “The Indian film industry is such a chauvinistic world that the ghost is almost always a woman, and that hasn’t changed for decades,” says film historian and critic Bhawana Somaaya. “What has changed is the nature of the films, the characters and the actors who play them. Where Madhubala appeared and disappeared in the 1949 black-and-white film Mahal, we now have comedy-horror Stree starring Shraddha Kapoor and Rajkummar Rao.”
Done right, such a role can be a great test of skill and craft, Somaaya adds. “The actor’s, production designer’s, make-up crew, and writer’s. A ghost story is only as good as its writer and director. And for the actor, it’s a chance to find out — can you really inhabit any role given to you?”
The trick, adds documentarian and film writer Paromita Vohra, is to balance identity and experience. “The film should, through the story, the actors and the characters, appeal to your basest fears as well as your highest emotions.”
Computer graphics, prosthetics and VFX have made it easier to bring such a vision to life, but that doesn’t lessen the drama for the actors playing the parts.
DANGLING FROM A HARNESS ALL NIGHT
You could say that it was Flora Saini’s feet that starred in Stree. For most of the film, that’s all you see of her. But the 34-year-old has no regrets.
“My face is only revealed in the climax, and the character was kept under wraps till the release, so I was absent from all the promotions,” Saini says, laughing. “But ever since, people call out, ‘O Stree’ when they see me on the road.”
The shoot itself was full of fun, shot on location in Chanderi, Madhya Pradesh, where a spirit named Stree is believed to haunt and abduct single men. “The first day there, the production team left me a list of dos and don’ts like ‘Don’t roam around with untied hair’.”
She had no lines to memorise, so she could enjoy the experience of being a horror film buff on a horror film set, just watching the story unfold.
“The twist is, throughout my shooting time, I was suspended. We would shoot all night, so I was hanging there all night, wearing a harness over my sari that really started to hurt my ribcage. It was painful and a challenge.”
A 13-YEAR-OLD GRANDMA
Actor Mohammad Samad, now 18, was 13 when he signed up to be transformed into the haunting, warts-encrusted grandmother / ghost in last year’s sleeper hit, Tumbbad. To make things more complicated, he also plays Pandurang, one of the key characters in the film.
“After a year of shooting, 90% of the film was re-shot. We realised that our idea for the sinister, supernatural character of Dadi was not working,” says co-producer Sohum Shah. The makers had wanted an obese Dadi. “But the weight was costing the character its essence. So we began looking for a thinner Dadi who could be wicked and mischievous too, and realised we had everything we needed in Samad.”
Well, almost everything. For a month, the teen spent six hours a day having prosthetics applied — rubbery masks and fake skins covered in scars, warts and even protruding metal bars.
“Moving around with all the extra weight was difficult, so I had to train to be stronger. But the main problem was breathing,” he says. “There were times when I just had to take the mask off. But that was such a big operation that I sometimes just used an oxygen mask instead. There was even a doctor present on set to make sure I was okay.”
Samad also couldn’t eat solids with his makeup on, so through the day he lived on juices and soups. “My love of horror movies helped me prepare for the role, and endure the demands it made on me,” he says. “When my friends saw Tumbbad, they didn’t know I was the young boy as well as the grandmother. Their reactions when I told them made me very happy.”
He’ll likely never be known as that scary old lady from Tumbbad. He’s known best for his role in the critically acclaimed Haraamkhor, but you might also know him from the Netflix original, Selection Day.
› The key problem was breathing. There were times when I just had to take the mask off. But that was such a big operation that I sometimes just used an oxygen mask instead. There was a doctor present on set to make sure I was okay. MOHAMMAD SAMAD , the malevolent old woman in Tumbbad
› I had no lines to memorise, so I could enjoy the experience of being a horror film buff on a horror film set. But we would shoot all night, so I was hanging there all night, wearing a harness over my sari that really started to hurt my ribcage. FLORA SAINI, the ghost in Stree
I had to crawl, military-style, on my arms, in full makeup, wig, corset and full-length gown... my face caked in Multani mitti that was leaching the moisture from my skin!
MEENAL KAPOOR, the ghost in 1920 London
At one point, I was tied to a tree, all wet, supposed to have been doused with kerosene. I felt cold and miserable. I was near tears. That’s when my NSD training came to the fore — the patience, perseverance, commitment theatre has taught me.
GEETANJALI KULKARNI, the ghost in Ragini MMS2
This ghost wasn’t tacky or titillating. She was vulnerable and human, and that’s what attracted me to the role. It was also fun seeing myself on posters in Mumbai, and in 3D replicas in Bengaluru and Chennai.
MANSI MULTANI, who played a withered crone more than twice her age, in the Anushka Sharma-starrer Pari
MUD ON YOUR FACE
The best thing about actor Meenal Kapoor’s ghost in 1920 London was that no special effects were used for her look. That was also the worst thing about it, for her.
“It took almost four hours to turn me into that ghost,” she moans. “The director, Tinu Desai, wanted cracks. So they used Multani mitti [a type of clay used in face masks]. Once it was on, I could barely move my face.”
It was also physically harrowing because Multani mitti leaches moisture from the skin and is typically worn for about 20 minutes. “My face was caked with it for eight hours!”
Before the film, the NSD graduate had been conducting design-direction and acting workshops, in addition to acting. “These workshops make you resilient, physically and mentally. So when I had to crawl, military-style, in full makeup, wig, corset and gown, that came in handy.”
Would she do it again. “I’ve done it. Why repeat it?” she says. “I wouldn’t mind playing a negative character, though.”
BEING SUNNY LEONE
“In my entire career, never had I thought that I would be required to mirror the movements that Sunny Leone was making on screen,” says Geetanjali Kulkarni. The National School of Drama graduate with 20 years in theatre, known for her roles in Mukti Bhawan and Court, shocked family, friends and fans as she accepted the role of the ghost / witch in Ragini MMS 2.
“When I heard the story, and was told I would work alongside Leone, I had to say yes. I had never played such a role in my life,” she says. “I had to lip sync to a song, do action sequences. It was fun.”
The scene where she had to mirror Sunny Leone still makes her laugh. “I was in a nine-yard sari. She was in a bikini. And the other actor, Parvin Dabas, was handcuffed to a bed. Leone was on top of him. She is supposed to be possessed by me in this scene. I was so awkward, I started making random talk with Dabas. The faces of my father, grandfather and uncles began flashing before my eyes. I imagined them watching me do this.”
It was Leone who finally helped her relax. “She showed me some thigh movements that I could repeat. It was really quite physically exhausting.”
At another point, tied to a tree, cold, wet and miserable, she remembers being near tears. “That’s when my NSD training came to the fore — all the patience, perseverance and commitment theatre has taught me.”
The movie came out and everyone around her was shocked. But I have no regrets, Kulkarni says.
30-YEAR-OLD CHUDAIL
When the feisty stage actor Mansi Multani agreed to play the grotesque, 75-year-old Kalapori in the Anushka Sharma-starrer Pari, she never thought she’d enjoy it as much as she did.
For the first time in her career, all her lines were gibberish. Her character is the devil’s consort, a young woman trapped in an ugly, withered body, whose job is to ensure the devil Ifrit’s line continues.
“It was very physical so I could use the ‘theatricality’ of my experiences with theatre.” It was the prosthetics that turned out to be the hardest part. It took 3.5 hours every day for her to get camera-ready. “Balancing the makeup with being creepy and convincing was a big challenge.”
But this ghost wasn’t tacky or titillating. “She is vulnerable and human,” says Multani, 30, “and that’s what attracted me to the role. It was also fun seeing myself on posters in Mumbai. Malls in Bengaluru and Chennai did some digital 3D mapping of our bodies and created mannequins. My friends sent me video of another very real me at the mall.”
The actor says she saw it as a unique opportunity.
“Not many actors in India have got this chance.” You’ll see her next, wearing her own face and starring in the as-yetunreleased Kadakh.