FTII gave me confidence, made me a performer, says Shatrughan Sinha

“But it is not my natural voice. Yes, I am finally admitting this. It took me months of riyaaz, yoga sessions as well as deep breathing techniques to master this tone of voice,” said the actor who is in Pune for the 13th Pune International Film Festival, where he was felicitated for his outstanding contribution to Indian cinema along with actress Tanuja Mukherjee and renowned Marathi poet N D Mahanor on Thursday.

Yet it was the same voice that was rejected by Patna Radio Station when he had gone for a live show when he mouthed the right dialogues at the wrong time. “They caught me by the ear and told me never to return,” he chuckles. Addressing the press a day later, Sinha, who has graduated from the acting class of the Film and Television Institute of India, dedicated this and all his future awards to the institute.

“Yes I had talent. But the things that I am known for today — my confidence, my oratory skills and my performance — they are what FTII gave me. Here we followed the guru-shishya tradition and teachers believed that if you have come here, make something out of yourself,” recalled Sinha.

Asked to speak about the Bollywood industry, the actor agreed that as compared to his heyday when an actor had an aura and was known for a certain mannerism or a signature gesture, today’s actors are judged by their ‘personality in totality’.

Coming from a family of intellectuals (of four brothers, three are doctors), he says he was the naughty child and joked about a college incident where he had been warned through a notice sent to all departments and the girls’ common room. “But I was happy because my name reached the girl’s common room,” joked the actor.

Sinha complained that critics and audiences often forgot the thin line between a role and a performance. “Sometimes even non-actors can pull off a movie, if the role is strong. And vice-versa, for a gifted actor. For e.g., a woman is shown tortured by the world and emerges strong, and people say what a performance. Though in rare situations, like Dilipsaab (Kumar) in Ganga Jamuna, both role and performance, could blow you away,” said Sinha, saying that, however, his greatest inspiration remains Raj Kapoor.

Director Subhash Ghai, who was present at the press interaction, recalled how Sinha would mouth two-page dialogues, without rehearsal and no retakes. “I have worked hard for it, worked on my language and grasping power. I remember the climax scene in Dostana that Yash Johar shot. Amitabh had to leave and we had just 15 minutes. I arrived, heard the dialogues during make-up and walked around to see how camera would pan and later gave a one-take shot. It was one of my memorable ones,” he adds.

Speaking about his daughter, Sonakshi, whose film Tevar released on Friday, he said that while the current movie is an entertainer, it is her performance in Lootera which is his personal favourite.

TANUJA MUKHERJEE: I wanted to be an interpreter at the UN

People assume that actress Tanuja Mukherjee who comes from a film family has always wanted to become an actress herself. “Actually it was my mother Shobhana Samarth who entered movies, otherwise my entire family (extended) was made up of intellectuals. Even as my elder sister, Nutan, had established herself in movies, I was sent off to Switzerland for higher studies. Here I actually harboured dreams of becoming an interpreter at the United Nations and started learning languages,” recalled the actress. But her dream was cut short by a financial crisis when she had to come back to India and start acting, which says came naturally to her as she was a ‘drama queen’. “As an actor, I realised my dream of becoming a communicator,” says Tanuja, whose linguistic passion was fulfilled as she dabbled in regional cinema. Asked about contemporary cinema, she says that she barely watched movies and even then, films these days don’t have much repeat value. “I watch a film, enjoy it and forget it. These days though we are technologically advanced, depth is lacking,” says the actor, who is happy that actresses are getting the leverage to experiment with roles nowadays.

PIFF in Pimpri for the first time

For the first time, the PIFF chapter was inaugurated in Pimpri-Chinchwad at the hands of Shatrughan Sinha at a ceremony that took place at Reliance Big Cinemas in Chinchwad. The ceremony was attended by PIFF director Jabbar Patel, Pimpri-Chinchwad Mayor Shakuntala Dharade, PCMC commissioner Rajeev Jadhav, actor Mohan Agashe, Rajat Kapoor, Sandeep Kulkarni, MP Shrirang Barne and others. After the inauguration ceremony, a special screening of Mahendra Teredesai’s movie, Dombivli Return, was arranged.