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Playing prudent
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Auro's mom is sensitive without being melodramatic, discloses Vidya Balan
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New Experience Vidya Balan in Paa
By now, we all know that Amitabh and Abhishek Bachchan share a unique bond in the rare father-son story “Paa”. We also know that Auro (Amitabh) is a 13-year-old boy who is prematurely old or suffers from progeria.
Enacting the role of a mother for a rapidly ageing child calls for some thought. Vidya Balan, when offered the role by director R. Balki, wasn't sure if she wanted to play mom to a 13-year-old Amitabh Bachchan.
Glad she did it
“I didn't know how to react. I listened to his narration and liked the conviction with which Balki wanted to make this film. He was neither hesitant nor arrogant and I was bowled over. He told me he wrote the film with Amitabh, Abhishek and me in mind and if one of us turned it down, he wouldn't make it. Even then, I wanted time to think.”
Days before “Paa”'s release, she is glad she accepted the part. “The actor in me liked the challenge but the vanity in me put forth obstacles,” she reflects.
Once she came on board, she pored over books, browsed the Net and watched documentaries on progeria. “I am a gynaecologist in the film and so I had to be informed,” she says. “The mother deals with the child with sensitivity instead of being apologetic, evoking sympathy and indulging in melodrama. And the film is not about progeria. It's a family drama and there are other issues in focus,” explains Vidya.
When Vidya was a student of St. Xavier's in Mumbai, she worked with an NGO that helped mentally-challenged children and feels that experience helped her understand the psyche of exceptional children and their parents better.
“Otherwise, I am not great with children. I am affectionate towards them but not overtly maternal.” Vidya is now proud of having done “Paa”: “How many actresses have had the opportunity to act as Amitabh Bachchan's mother and that too a 13-year-old Amitabh?”
After “Paa”, Vidya looks forward to Vishal Bharadwaj's production “Ishqiya”.
SANGEETHA DEVI DUNDOO
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