Ayesha Kapur, best known for playing the role of the deaf and mute Michelle McNally in the cult classic Black (2005), was shocked to see the film in the ‘New Releases’ section on an OTT platform recently. The actor was sad when the film was taken down on YouTube, but now that it’s streaming on OTT, “more viewers will see it, including my friends from college in America”. “I was surprised that it wasn’t on any online platform for the longest time. I think being on OTT makes it more accessible,” adds the 29-year-old.

Released 19 years ago, the Sanjay Leela Bhansali directorial features actor Amitabh Bachchan as McNally’s teacher Debraj Sahai, while Rani Mukerji played the role of the older McNally. But Kapur’s role won her a lot of appreciation: “It affected the blind and deaf community and even became a cult film in South Korea. It’s crazy to think where all this film was travelled and the impact it made on people from different demographics.”

However, all of nine years at the time of the film’s shooting, Kapur wasn’t “exposed to Bollywood and really didn’t know what I was getting into”. Ask how she pulled off such a powerful performance and the actor says, “I didn’t have any star complex [at that time, which is why] I could play that part. It was only later that I realized how intense playing Michelle was, but I fell in love with acting through this process.”