Interview: Udita Goswami

It is hard for most people to be taken seriously in Bollywood. No matter how much one tries, oftentimes it takes a long while before industry insiders see true, meaty value in any given actor.

Still, that has not kept model-turned-actress Udita Goswami from impatiently demanding her turn in Bollywood as a top-notch thespian. After all, Udita likes to believe she already has two substantially qualitative films under her belt in Rokk and Paap. Accordingly, Udita wonders why, despite proof she can do significant roles that challenge her realm, she is still being typecast.

“I haven’t got my due in Bollywood, which I should have gotten ’til now. I have given films, done meaningful roles that not all actresses get,” she pondered to the press. “I feel the reason for my being on the back-foot could be that I don’t believe in public relation practices, which have become a regular routine for any celebrity. But that is something I can’t do. There are certain things I don’t want to change about myself. I do my work with all honesty, and there is no scope for short-cuts or cheating.”

It is her honest, non-cheating approach that baffles Udita, as she believes she is making every effort to avoid being typecast. Still, the 26-year-old actress who starred in last week’s release of Chase told reporters she is doing all she can to diversify her resume and avoid being locked into one genre.

“I have been doing all kinds of roles, but still I have been typecast with this ‘bold tag,’” she told the press. “The only thing I think of that I have not done is a happy romantic kind of film — romantic comedy. I know it is strange since most of the actresses have done something like that and not done the kinds of films I have done. I want to actually do something that is so common. I’m really looking forward to doing a happy romantic film now.”

So just what, exactly, is Udita doing to make sure she avoids being permanently typecast as a “bold” actress? Well, for starters, she told reporters the first step is to be wary of who she affiliated with. Indeed, when Udita switched from modeling to acting in 2003 (when she debuted in Pooja Bhatt’s Paap), the actress said she paid close attention to who the director was. The same was true of Zeher, when she worked with Emraan Hashmi and Shamita Shetty.

“I look at a lot of things — first the script, then the setup that you are working in, and then the most important thing: the director,” she told the press. “Even if it is a very regular script, it is the director who makes all the difference in giving the same ghisaa pitaa (regular) story an interesting look.”

But beyond analyzing the script and filmmaker, Udita is also taking steps in her own life to show she is committed to diversifying her career as much as possible. To that end, she revealed she is returning to school to complete the studies she abruptly ended to pursue the very career path she is now on.

“I’m going to Los Angeles. I’m enrolling myself to the New York Academy. It’s time I set my priorities right. I don’t care if 80 percent of our industry is not well-read. I don’t want to be one of them,” she emphatically told the press. “I agree that I started my career quite early, but I don’t want my kids to ever say that ‘our mother is not even well-educated.’ One can achieve what he wants, but being educated is very important.”

It definitely looks like Udita has her priorities in order, and it is only a matter of time before Bollywood recognizes such prudent planning and will escalate the young actress to stardom. In the meantime, expect to continue seeing Udita play “bold” roles, such as a spy-themed character in Sunny Deol’s The Man and another meaty personality opposite Akshay Kumar and Suniel Shetty in Shabnam Kapoor’s Hello India.