Sanjeeda Shaikh talks about her transition to films and fight with her good friend Mouni Roy
Kavita Awaasthi (HINDUSTAN TIMES; December 1, 2019)

Sanjeeda Shaikh is looking forward to the next year as she has two film releases lined up. The actor has been acting since 2005 in popular TV dramas and later did a web series, Gehraiyaan. She also featured in music videos including the recent one, Ruka Hoon.

She admits that films happened to her of late and not earlier in her career. “I feel, one is destined to get what you get. Obviously, I wanted to do films and thankfully, for the last couple of years, many actors from TV have transitioned to films. They have done really well and, thankfully, the filmmakers have started taking actors from TV seriously. Earlier, when I would go for auditions, they would love my take but later say that my face is overexposed on TV,” she says.

Glad about the progression in the industry, which led to newer concepts and different stories being told, Sanjeeda feels that this also resulted in the industry as well as the audiences becoming more accepting of new faces. She says, “Today, the lines have been blurred and the medium doesn’t matter. This line of thought has worked in my favour. I have done so much TV in my life that at this stage of my career, creative satisfaction was quite important for me. I have learnt all that I could on TV and I know, I will always get work on TV but the hunger inside me as an actor needed this transition to films.”

She recently wrapped up the shoot of a film on female infanticide called, Kaali Khuhi, where she plays a mother to an eight-year-old. “Earlier, whenever I was offered a mother’s role, I would worry about being tagged with the image but thankfully, today I am more confident of myself as an actor. I took on this role as a challenge.” Doing feature films is a relatively new experience for Sanjeeda. She had a ball shooting in Amritsar, Punjab for a month and later shot for Bejoy Nambiar’s Taish in London, UK, for 40 days.

Tiff with Mouni Roy
Sanjeeda Shaikh and her good friend Mouni Roy unfollowed each other on Instagram and buzz is that they are no longer friends. Ask her about it and Sanjeeda says, “I don’t want to talk about it. Generally speaking, in a relationship, when you are into each other or fight, you still wish well for the other person. I am happy with whatever she is doing and if things have to be okay (between us), they will be. We have shared some great years of friendship and that was beautiful.”