All that she wanted to do in life was get in front of the camera. Today, Arya is happy that she has fulfilled her dream of becoming an actress. In fact, these days she is busy balancing her shooting schedules of ‘Badai Bungalow’ and ‘Sthreedhanam’ on Asianet and ‘Ishtam’ on Surya TV along with her stage programmes. She also has to devote time for her husband and daughter. However, she is enjoying the phase and is looking forward to doing such interesting roles. Over to Arya:
Romancing the camera
As a young girl, I loved acting in front of the mirror. My ambition was to become an actress. But that didn’t happen for long and in the meantime, I focussed on dance. I opted out of learning classical dance because I was too lazy to learn the steps and the mudras. I learnt Western, cinematic and semi-classical dance and used to perform for stage shows and television programmes.
While doing my Plus Two, I got a chance to act in the serial ‘Officer’, a crime series on Amrita TV. I was part of two stories. After that I got married, which was a turning point of my life. My husband’s elder sister, Kalpana, is a model and when I found her portfolio, I immediately decided make one myself. Once that was ready, I started getting modelling offers and I was lucky to work for some leading clients, such as Chennai Silks and Chemmannur Jewellers.
A major work that came my way was the Tamil remake of the Malayalam hit serial ‘Ente Manasaputhri’, thanks to my sister-in-law Archana who played the lead role, Glory. I got a meaty role in the Tamil version, ‘Maharani’. Meanwhile, I became a mother and I took a break from films for nearly two years. Though I was away from the scene, I did get offers on coming back – serials such as ‘Mohakkadal’, ‘Achante Makkal’ and ‘Ardram’.
‘Badai Bungalow’
I was a participant of the reality show ‘Stars’ on Asianet, which was for serial artistes. In one of the episodes we did a spoof on the movie Njaan Gandharvan . That was when the team of ‘Badai Bungalow’ was looking for a new face to play Ramesh Pisharody’s wife. My performance in ‘Stars’ was appreciated by the channel and they suggested my name to Diana Sylvester, producer of ‘Badai Bungalow ’.
Handling comedy
Except for the skits in ‘Stars’ I have never done comedy before. So Diana chechi was actually taking a huge risk by casting me though there were many established comediennes around. Initially I was nervous and scared about sharing the screen with actors such as Ramesh Pisharody, Dharmajan, Manoj, Praseetha and Mukesh. But they helped me a lot with the comic timing and dialogue delivery.
Now we are a close-knit family. The best thing that has happened to me through the show is that I could share the stage with a lot of artistes I have idolised. On top of the list is definitely an episode with Mohanlal.
Family vs career
It is not easy because I have to squeeze in time for my two-and-half-year old daughter, Roya, and husband, Rohit Susheelan. But then, he is very supportive and understanding because the family has members who are already in the industry.
Way ahead
Well, I am waiting for the next big thing, cinema. Offers have started coming in after ‘Badai Bungalow’, but nothing has been finalised yet.
