Meena Iyer (DNA; January 24, 2019)

It is such a strange coincidence. When three-time National Award winner Kangana Ranaut met the media in Varanasi for the launch of Manikarnika - The Queen Of Jhansi on May 4, 2017, she had spoken about how she wanted to don the director’s hat immediately after she had finished shooting for the historical. At that point, the reins of the project were held by South filmmaker, Krish (Radha Krishna Jagarlamudi) and the style maven was contributing to it as the protagonist. However, fate had other plans and she, eventually, ended up in the driver’s seat.

Recalling her first experience as the captain of the ship, the actress, who is dressed in a beautiful chiffon sari with pearls adorning her neck, smiles and tells us, “I don’t know how it happens, it comes naturally to me. You must have noticed that my craft drastically changed with Queen (2014) as I had helmed a short film, The Touch (2012), earlier. I contributed a lot towards writing and all of that. Where direction came from, I have no idea. I’m comfortable in this job. In fact, scarily comfortable, honestly (smiles).”

She adds, “I see directors complaining all the time. They find it intimidating. They feel they’re not valued enough as a technician, they are the first to come to the set and last to leave, unless one is a star director. Then, it also depends which hero you sign on, your calibre doesn’t matter. Even the biggest directors are struggling to get dates. Obviously, they don’t get paid as much as actors, they work behind the camera, they lead a deglamourised life. From the recce to the art, whatever happens before the fame, is where the director lives.”

However, the talented artiste exclaims, “Having experienced both sides (acting and direction) and understanding how underprivileged this side of filmmaking is, I still feel there’s something magical about it. I can’t help but keep falling for it.”

Quiz her if the historical’s huge canvas overwhelmed her when she had to step in midway to take over the reins and she replies, “To be honest, when producers Kamal ji (Jain) and Zee Studios approached me with the idea, they said, ‘The way we want to make it, we don’t see any director doing justice. There hasn’t been a proper period action film in our industry. We’ve had period dramas either about love stories or revenge. But no one has made an action film set in history.’ They were considering roping in Nick Powell (of the Bourne Identity and X-Men: The Last Stand fame) for the action and were like, ‘What ’s left is drama. So, why don’t you do it?’ I told them it doesn’t work like that. I was not sure this is my genre, and this couldn’t be my first film as a director. Later, when this whole thing happened, my biggest concern was the movie’s scale, theatrical approach and the grand operatic cinema that I don’t identify with at all. So, I had all these obstacles. However, Krish had already set up a huge portion of it, which was of great help.”