Debarati Sen (BOMBAY TIMES; December 18, 2018)

Bollywood has seen star kids following their famous parents’ footsteps into the industry. However, Shweta Bachchan is an exception. Despite growing up in the public gaze — as the daughter of Amitabh and Jaya Bachchan — Shweta, by her own admission, was a painfully shy girl. Talking about this at the Times Litfest at Mehboob Studio (Bandra), she said, “The cameras, flashes and the paparazzi — it was something I was terrified of and I was always hiding behind my parents. I wasn’t social either — I had become very tall early on, so I was this awkward, gawky girl. In school, I would audition, but would be made to play a tree or be part of a choir, while my brother (Abhishek Bachchan) would always bag the main lead roles. So, we all knew early on that acting and the stage was not for me.”

‘AS A KID, I DIDN’T KNOW MY MOTHER WAS AN ACTRESS’
Her parents might have been the biggest names in Bollywood, but Shweta recalled how they never brought work home. She shared, “We had a protected childhood and we were not exposed to the industry. My father would never talk about work at home or come back with make-up on; we didn’t have film magazines at home. In fact, as a child, I didn’t even know that my mother was an actress. I was introduced to Hindi movies much later in life. Once, I saw my brother watching a film in which my father was being beaten up. I was so terrified that I began screaming and refused to watch it.”

‘I REALLY WANTED TO HAVE ‘BUILDING’ FRIENDS’
Shweta, who has always lived in a bungalow, said that as a kid, she wanted to stay in a ‘building’. Perhaps, it’s not surprising then that her first book, Paradise Towers, is also based on life in a building. She shared, “As a child, I led a sheltered life in a bungalow. However, Mumbai has always been a city of high-rises and that fascinated me. My friends in school would talk about their ‘building friends’ and I never had any. So, I would feel left out and I really wanted building friends.”

‘I DON’T WANT TO PLEASE ANYONE’
Interestingly, it’s in her forties that Shweta started two careers — as a writer and as a fashion entrepreneur. In fact, the 44-year-old believes that 40s are the best decade in a woman’s life. She added, “I am definitely more comfortable in my skin now. In your forties, you know yourself, the things that count and the people who matter. I feel that teens and twenties are the toughest because you are sensitive to everything people are saying. At 40, I don’t want to please anyone anymore.”