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FILM INTERVIEW: GISELLE MONTEIRO

Red Chiles Entertainment Brings Brazilian Model Back to Bollywood in Always Kabhi Khabhi

By: Simran Mody
June 13, 2011

Giselle MonteiroBollywood seems to be falling in love with Brazil. In 2007, Yash Raj Films shot the first ever Hindi film in the country, what with Dhoom 2 taking the streets of Rio de Janeiro. Two years later, Brazil returned the favor and sent one of its own to Mumbai when Giselle Monteiro made her Bollywood acting debut in Love Aaj Kaal. Now in 2011, the Espirito Santo native and Brazilian supermodel-turned-Bollywood-actress is gearing up for her next Hindi film blockbuster, as Ms. Monteiro stars as Aishwarya Dhawan in Red Chilles Entertainment’s Always Kabhi Kabhi.

 
Of course, being Brazilian, it is not easy to convince audiences she is Indian, let alone a Punjabi girl, as she portrays in Roshann Abbas’ Always Kabhi Kabhi. In speaking with an Indian news outlet about her role as Aishwarya, Ms. Monteiro briefly summed up the universal aspects of her character which made it easier for her to bring her on-screen persona to life.
 
“She is a very sweet and shy schoolgirl,” Ms. Monteiro told the press about Aishwarya.
 
Sweetness, shyness, and universalities aside, the former cover girl for ELLE, Harpers Bazaar, Femina, and Marie Clarie who also serves as brand ambassador for Wills Lifestyle, Movil Mobiles, and PC Jewellers, said she also had to up her Hindi speaking skills to properly play her character in Always Kabhi Kabhi.
 
“For me, the preparation was more on the language. I attended Hindi workshops before the movie. (The) director of this movie, Roshan Abbas, also advised me a lot, and I followed them,” she told the press.
 
Of course, following Mr. Abbas’ directorial instructions was quite easy to the increased “Indianness” she had to take on in just her second Bollywood film.
 
“The transformation for the film Love Aaj Kaal was far more tough than this one. It was my first film and I hardly knew Bollywood then,” Ms. Monteiro told the press. “But now it is more known to me. Moreover, playing the Punjabi girl needed more transformation and preparation than a school-going teen, as I believe, in every country, school students share same characteristics, more or less.”
 
One thing that will not be the same is Ms. Monteiro’s involvement in Always Kabhi Kabhi. Thankfully for her, she has more speaking lines in the Red Chilles production than she did in Love Aaj Kaal.
 
“Here you will see me saying more dialogue … (whereas) in Love Aaj Kaal, I did not have too many lines to deliver,” she stated to the press, adding that she is hopeful Always Kabhi Kabhi will do well this weekend against five other new releases. “We all have worked hard for this movie. We all are hoping for a good response from the audience.”
 
Produced by Gauri Khan, and also starring Ali Fazal, Satish Shah, Lilette Dubey, and Shah Rukh Khan in a cameo appearance, Always Kabhi Kabhi, which is distributed by Eros Entertainment, releases on June 17th.