Neha Sharma, 23, may have done fashion designing and is an actor today, but in many ways she still remains a small town girl from Bhagalpur. While she took a break from Telugu films after her first film Chirutha with Ram Charan, she would love to do a Telugu film today as she enjoys the dancing, travelling and money that comes with it. Ahead of her upcoming film Yamla Pagla Deewana 2 with the Deols, she talks to TOI about her first co-star Ram Charan, the tech-savvy Sunny Deol and why box office performance is more important than looks and talent. Excerpts:
How did you get into films?
I was born and brought up in Bhagalpur. My dad is a businessman who owns petrol pumps there. I moved to Delhi in Class XI and studied at Carmel Covent School, after which I did my fashion designing from NIFT where I was a rank holder. Right from my childhood, I wanted to be a fashion designer and was obsessed with Armani and Versace and simply loved clothes. I was fit and tall and was used as a model by my seniors to showcase their clothes to the jury for judging them. I did my internship at Canada and was offered a job at Coach, but thankfully I didn’t do it. I used to go to this gym in GK II where my gym instructor Maria would always tell me to get my photoshoot done. I got that done and was called to Hyderabad based on my pictures to meet Ram Charan, Chiranjeevi’s son, for his launch film Chirutha. My director told me that a part of the film would be shot in New Zealand and Vikram Phadnis would design the clothes. It sounded like a paid holiday and even though I was just in my fourth year, I said yes to it.
There were rumours of you dating Chiranjeevi’s son Ram Charan. Were you dating him?
He was like starry and was not talkative at all in the beginning. My director told me he was shy and I guess it is protocol in Telugu cinema where you can’t be over-friendly if you are the son of a superstar like Chiranjeevi. So, they try and keep that cold and reserved facade. The lives of star kids are quite guarded and they are super careful of how they conduct themselves as there is a lot riding on them. Mr Chiranjeevi was on the set for quite sometime. As I got to know Charan, I realised he was quite chilled out and nice and was a great dancer. He was the first guy I was working with and we were like two kids working together. He may have flirted a bit, but basically we became friends by the end of the film. While we are still in touch, when you are working in different industries, it’s too much to expect your friendship to stay alive.
Being from a business family from Bhagalpur, were your parents comfortable with the idea of you being an actor?
As a kid, I was severely asthmatic and was always unwell and weak physically. So, I became the favourite, pampered child amongst four siblings. My connection with Hyderabad began way before I did my film there. There is a family in Hyderabad who are blessed and can cure you of your asthma. You have to go to them for three years where they put a live fish in your mouth and you need to swallow it. I got completely cured and I am a believer. The asthma had gone, but the pampering remained. So they let me do whatever I wanted, be it fashion designing or films.
Chirutha was a blockbuster but your first Hindi film Crook bombed. Did it affect you emotionally?
After doing Chirutha, I was offered many more Telugu films, but I did not accept them as I wanted to take a break. Telugu films involve high-speed dancing and other than kathak, I had not learnt dancing. So I went to Pineapple Studio in London to train in different forms of dance. I came back and did Crook. Chirutha had worked, so I didn’t expect Crook to not work. When a film bombs, nobody cares what your talent is or what your performance was. What happens is that you don’t get work. That’s when I realised that acting and looks don’t help, what does help is the box office performance. I used to feel really sad, but one of the things that kept giving me confidence was reading compliments on a fake Facebook page created by my fans.
Being from Bhagalpur, are you in any way still a girl from a small town?
Yes, in many ways I am still a girl from a small town. For instance, I was uncomfortable doing love scenes in Crook though I gave in a bit in Jayanta Bhai Ki Luv Story. I have had only one affair in my life. He was an NRI from Canada who I had met at the same GK II gym. I chose to do my internship in Canada to be close to him. Our long-distance relationship did not last, but from my point of view, I wanted to get married to him. I am emotional, love cooking and am conservative in the sense that I would like to be with a single guy. My parents even today won’t be ok knowing that I would have had a boyfriend ever.
Yamla Pagla Deewana 2 is a big film. How was your experience working with the Deols?
We shot for three months in England. Dharamji actually broke the ice with me on the first day. He treated me like an actor and not a junior. He is extremely passionate. At his age, you can afford to lose interest, but he remembers everything right from my sister’s name to every expression in a scene. While he would talk to me in English, it was interesting that if Dharamji, Sunny and Bobby were dancing together and Dharamji forgot a step, Sunny would talk to him only in Punjabi. Unlike Sunny and Bobby, who are shy and don’t talk much, Dharamji talks to everyone and would enjoy even his sessions of sher shayari with Anu Kapoor.
I am a freak when it comes to time and would be there sharp at 6 am that was our call time. But I would always find Sunny there before me. He is so disciplined that he will work out at 4 am for a shoot that would start at 6 am. I remember one of the nights the iPad mini had released at midnight and my sister and I were discussing it. As soon as I saw Sunny in the morning, he told me, ‘iPad mini is launched’! I kept wondering how does Sunny know this. How gadgety can he be? It’s okay for people of our age to track things like that, but Sunny shocked me. Bobby is child-like and would play cricket on the set. He does not stress on the set and is truly easy to work with. While all of them are from a film family, they are also non-filmi in many ways. They don’t understand all this networking and marketing and let’s work with the right producer and director kind of things. They are family people who would like to work with friends and are not competitive like other actors today.
