MUMBAI MIRROR (October 29, 2018)

From an academically inclined girl to an actress, Taapsee Pannu’s journey has been a roller-coaster ride and she admits she’s loving’ it though she hadn’t planned on such a career choice. “I wanted to do MBA in marketing and get a regular job, probably something creative but in the MBA space, definitely not this risky or crazy. I jumped into this profession only to while away one year of my life while I prepped for my MBA. I accepted two films, one in Tamil and one in Telugu, and told myself, ‘Let’s have fun… enjoy. Rather than sitting at home and only studying, might as well learn something new as well,’” she reminisced.

The Telugu film, Jhummandi Naadam, was a hit while the Tamil one, Aadukalam won multiple National Awards. That’s when she felt it was destiny’s way of telling her “something” and she should listen to it. “I've been crazily adventurous with my life though now age has made me sober down a little bit. I love doing something which is not expected,” she laughs, admitting that the urge to explore, once took her into a forest near Central Delhi with a weird history and a reputation of being haunted.

At the time she admits she did get Hindi film offers but she hadn’t heard about the people in the Hindi film industry. “But when I googled guys who offered films to me in South, I realised they were really big names,” she points out.

Today, she is well entrenched in Hindi cinema, but there’s one South filmmaker she really wants to work with. “I want to be a Mani Ratnam heroine once because his heroines are very real and at the same time pure and aspirational,” she says dreamily, ready for another adventure.