Deepika Padukone talks about her foray into films. How did she feel debuting with Shah Rukh? “I was stunned. I first met Farah while she was rehearsing for a song. She said, ‘Lets see how you do. The lead actor is SRK.’ She had only seen me in a Himesh (Reshamiya) video before then. At the time Shah Rukh was working on ‘Chak de!’, so I had a year to prepare. Once I knew it was him, I didn’t want any other role, so I really worked hard. I took Kathak classes, worked out.
I remember the first time I met him, Farah took me to his house, and now things have changed, but back then, everything was white. White sofa, curtains… and I in total Yash Chopra style, wore a white chicken suit with a chiffon dupatta, and tried to camouflage myself. I pretended to be really cool, so I started flipping a book, but I was freaking out. I sat stiff as a board,” she said, laughing. How does you feel being called the hottest girl on earth? “It’s nice to hear that but I’m not very conscious about it.” How and why did you switch from being a sportswoman to an actor?
“I was very keen on being an actor. If I saw Madhuri dance around in Switzerland, I liked to believe I could do it too. I wasn’t fanatic about it; I wouldn’t practise in front of a mirror. So when the opportunity presented itself, I took it. But I’m very attached to sports. I grew up going for practice everyday at 5 am, for four hours a day.
Now that I feel like I have some influence, I like to support sports as much as possible,” she said. Would you head to Hollywood? Deepika replied, “I would like to, but offers here are so good that they really need to match up.”
