Sangeeta Yadav (HINDUSTAN TIMES; November 8, 2019)

With over three decades in Bollywood, actor Juhi Chawla has worked in the best of both worlds — out-and-out commercial Bollywood movies and offbeat films. But what brought a huge transformation to her life and career was marriage and motherhood.

“There was a time when I used to do big-budget films with a huge troupe dancing in the background... some were commercial Bollywood or romance films. Then I got married and had kids and I stopped getting those kind of roles. What was offered to me was 3 Deewarein, Jhankaar Beats (both in 2003), My Brother Nikhil (2005) and many others that were very offbeat and not the typical Bollywood masala movies,” says Juhi.

When the actor started doing small-budget movies, she wasn’t “very comfortable”, but later she says she found the change “very refreshing”.

“Suddenly, I started doing small-budget films. The 30-40 dancers that I used to dance with disappeared. The actors were different, the sets looked more real, the unit would be smaller and you’d get to know everybody you worked with. Sometimes I’d even help them setup too,” says the Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga actor.

She adds how her makeup didn’t take “an hour-and-a-half or more”. She says, “I used to take just 20 minutes to dressup. Even the way they’d require me to act was different from the dialogue-baazi I did in my previous films. It was like a breath of fresh air.”

After becoming a mother to Jhanvi (18) and Arjun (16), the actor made a conscious decision to be very particular about her work. Juhi says, “As my kids were also little, I was doing fewer films in a year. So, there was a slowdown, but the films kept coming.”

During that time, Juhi also started experimenting with Punjabi films, such as Des Ho Yaa Pardes (2004) and Waris Shah (2007). As of now, she is happy “work keeps coming” and that keeps her going.