New York to Chennai

Here’s what transpired when Sudhish Kamath accidentally met actress Pooja Kumar during his recent visit to New York.

December 05, 2014 03:50 pm | Updated April 07, 2016 02:53 am IST

Pooja Kumar. Photo: K. V. Srinivasan

Pooja Kumar. Photo: K. V. Srinivasan

It’s always surreal to bump into an actress from a movie in a city the movie is set in, especially when it’s far away from home. In this case, New York. Pooja Kumar, the leading lady of Vishwaroopam 1 and 2 .

We meet at the South Asian International Film Festival. For a change, it’s my film that’s playing there and I’m the one being interviewed. But we decide to get a cup of coffee to talk about the Vishwaroopam sequel the very next day.

We end up chatting at the HBO office in the Avenue of the Americas, a block away from Times Square, at the end of a networking luncheon organised by the festival.

“When I was first approached for Vishwaroopam , I did not know there were going to be two parts to it,” she says. “I just knew I was working with this fantastic actor-director-writer-filmmaker, someone who is just dedicated to cinema… Someone who has dedicated his life to the art form. And that’s the kind of people I like working with.”

The production had seen her work online. “My manager asked me if I had heard of an actor called Kamal Haasan (she says his name in an American accent) and I said: YESS! Of course! My first Hindi movie was Ek Duje Ke Liye and I’ve been watching Kamal sir’s movies even as a child. And then we scheduled a Skype call and that call was like five minutes.”

She remembers the details. “He was like: I’m Kamal Haasan. And I’m like: Yes, I know who you are. You don’t need to introduce yourself ( laughs ). And I was freaking out while on Skype, I have to admit. Because I couldn’t believe I was speaking to the one and only Kamal sir. And five days later, I am on a plane to Chennai not knowing the script, not knowing anything about it. I just jumped in.”

Did she always know there was going to be a sequel?

“When we were shooting Part 1, he would talk about making a sequel depending on the success… I think he always knew what he was going to do in his mind but he only shared it with us a little later.”

She can’t stop talking about how excited she is about her role in the sequel. “I was lucky. I became the only Indian actress to do underwater action sequences because I am a certified scuba diver and a life guard. I grew up in the water. I have a lot of action scenes. So I am super excited about that.”

I try to find out if the film continues from where it left or is going to be an entirely new episode. “You are going to have to wait and see. I can’t divulge anything about the story or my character.”

Being an actress trained in the U.S., she has had to adapt quite a bit to Indian conditions. “But I have found both experiences similar. I come from the school of sync sound but here, someone else dubbed for me in Tamil. But I still had to act, listen, observe and do the mouth movements like I speak the language. I dubbed for the Hindi version myself. I love dubbing because it’s a second chance to bring in the nuances.”

Kamal Haasan had discussed Uttama Villain with her briefly during the shoot of Vishwaroopam . “He didn’t offer me the role then. But as we worked together again, Andrea, me and him, we celebrated the camaraderie and I think that’s why he asked me to do Uttama Villain . I’m very excited again because my roles are very different. In Vishwaroopam 2 , I do a lot of action sequences and Uttama Villain is a period piece. So I had to learn 18th century Tamil dialogues.”

Both these films, currently under post-production, should be out in 2015, she says. And you can tell the amount of respect she has for Kamal Haasan for writing strong women characters.

“All his movies if you see… in his pedigree of films, all his female artists have had pretty good roles. And they’ve been tastefully done. There’s a purpose for why she’s there, she has a character arc… there are so many things his female characters have done in his movies which I was very appreciative about when we started the movie a long time ago.”

Her acting career in the U.S. is going great too, she says. “I just did a show for CBS called Unforgettable and there are a few other things coming up. I live out of a suitcase. I am an actor. So wherever I get interesting roles, that’s where I’m gonna go. I would love to be in Chennai to do more films. What I love about the Tamil industry is that it has changed so much and progressed so much from what it was 20 years ago, to ten years ago to now… Everyone I meet in Hollywood is interested about what I’m doing in Tamil because they know A.R. Rahman, they want to know about the singer from Life of Pi (Bombay Jayasree). Ashok Amritraj and Vijay Amritraj are from Tamil Nadu and they have created a name for themselves in Hollywood. So they all know what’s going on.”

And she’s picked up some Tamil along the way too. And just waiting to do more work in Chennai.

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