Madhuri Dixit-Nene on Total Dhamaal: Wanted to revisit over-the-top comedies
Returning to Hindi cinema after four years with Total Dhamaal, Madhuri Dixit-Nene says she is armed with promising script and her favourite co-star, Anil Kapoor
Sonil Dedhia (MID-DAY; February 9, 2019)

It's always a delight to see Madhuri Dixit-Nene on screen. As she returns to Hindi cinema after Gulaab Gang (2014), the actor is ready to serve up a heady dose of nostalgia - in a hark back to the '90s, she is reuniting with Anil Kapoor and director Indra Kumar for Total Dhamaal. The trio had delivered the runaway success Beta (1992) earlier.

Though she stayed away from mindless comedies during her second stint at the movies, the actor says that the past few years had her itching to revisit the genre. "I was looking to let my hair down and work in a commercial, over-the-top mad comedy - a genre that I haven't done in a while. I remember working in Raja (1995), Khel (1992) and some other films in the '90s. I wanted to revisit that space. I thought Total Dhamaal was the right film, which had all the ingredients for a great comedy."

If getting an opportunity to explore her comic timing was an incentive, pairing up with Kapoor, she admits, was "sone pe suhaga". "I had seen the first part [Dhamaal, 2007] and thoroughly enjoyed it. And I loved the script that Indu ji offered me. It was only later that he told me that he was planning to bring Anil and me together. I thought that was sone pe suhaga. We are coming together after Pukar (2000)."

Having collaborated on more than 12 films together, it is only natural that Dixit and Kapoor's bond goes beyond movies. She says that he stayed in touch with her when she set up base in the US, in the interim. "Anil would visit me in Denver whenever he would be in the US and had the time. He is one of a kind and his craft has only improved over the years."

Madhuri Dixit-Nene in Total Dhamaal