Ananya Panday speaks about Gehraiyaan
By Sanskriti Ramachandran
“I remember when Shakun and Aisha narrated the script to me, I actually was like, ‘Can I just go to the bathroom?’ and I didn’t come out for like 20 minutes and I think they got scared that I fainted or something like that in the bathroom. But I was like in shock that this project was even going to come to me I was just happy to be a part of a film like this Shakun was literally on my bucket list and I was just in shock that he wanted to work with me and was thinking of me for this role,” says Ananya about working in Gehraiyaan.
Ananya didn’t believe her luck because deep inside she did want to work with Shakun after seeing Kapoor and Sons. “I was such a big fan of Kapoor and sons because of the kind of films he makes. Shakun was a dream director. He was on my bucket list and when I went home, I put a little tick mark next to his name. I was really maybe super emotional,” she says and narrates her experience
“My first meeting with Shakun was kind of funny. I thought that when I meet him I have to watch all these foreign cinema films and so I watched Swedish films and Polish films. When I went to meet him he was like this super chilled out guy. So I was like – ‘Shakun is like my kind of guy actually’. He was so chilled and we are like really good friends now,” says Ananya.
The Student Of the Year 2 actress is rather overawed by Shakun’s process of filmmaking too. “He’s completely an actor’s director and I mean it and I’m sure Deepika Sid and Dhairya will vouch for this as well. The amount of space he gives the actors. He does these small things like, ‘I won’t call action until you’re ready and we will go whenever you’re ready’. He stresses on the importance of preparation. He talks you through an idea and he actually makes you believe that you’ve really thought this whole thing when actually he was kind of seeding it into your head. So it’s a very interesting process with him,” she adds.
“So it was just my biggest blessing to be a part of this film and just the relationships that we’ve made on this film were great. We were all in Goa together for two months and we were sent away and it was probably the best thing that happened to us. We actually became so close. Every single person involved in this was like family to us and every moment in this film has been magical,” she says.
Ananya feels that working in a film about love, lust and longing like Gehraiyaan had a deep impact in her thinking apart from making changes in her as a human being. “I feel like I’ve not just changed as an actor but as a person and it’s going to be amazing and that it's coming on Amazon now. I know that Gehraiyaan has a very large audience and the right audience as well. So it’s just the biggest blessing for me to work with Karan, Shakun, Deepika, Sid and Dhairya.”