Christmas is a festival our family has always celebrated ardently, along with the Parsi New Year,” says Tara Sutaria, who grew up watching her nani and nana host grand Christmas bashes – a tradition that she plans to continue with her twin sister, Pia.

Tara, who hosts intimate Christmas dinners for her loved ones leading up to the festival, enjoys cooking the meal herself.“The festive dinner is just an excuse to cook good food and have a good time with your friends and family. It’s a family tradition to make Christmas pudding every year. During this season, everybody takes a break, so we come together to eat, drink and just make merry,” she says.

Talking about her favourite memories of the festival, Tara shares, “When I was a kid, our neighbour’s son would come dressed as Santa Claus, and we believed that Santa was real. There would be so many gifts under the Christmas tree during the dinner party. There would be a gift for every guest. I have fond memories of my nana and nani hugging each other by the Christmas tree. There’s a 30-year age gap between them, and my idea of romance comes from that (smiles). Also, I enjoy celebrating Christmas in London. In December, everyone in England is celebrating the holidays. We have family there and we love celebrating the festival with them.”

With a few days left to usher 2024, the Heropanti 2 actress looks back at the year that was. She says, “2023 has been a year of many unexpected things for me. Personally, there has been a lot of introspection and a lot of downs, but some incredible ups, too. Professionally, Apurva released online and it was the best thing that happened to me.”

The survival thriller saw Tara play an intense role. She adds, “I am touched with the kind of response I received from everyone. I hope 2024 has only good and positive things, both personally and professionally, in store for me.”

Tara, who’s known for her singing skills, shares, “I remember as a kid, I would go to this street very close to my home where they have a festival called Carols. It is a very sweet way of encouraging and celebrating talent from Bandra. It’s where people from the locality come and sing carols. That apart, it is a family tradition at home during Christmas dinners where my parents ask me to sing carols, so it is either Silent Night or O Holy Night.”

It would be Arjun Kapoor because he loves food as much as I do! And we cook so much for Christmas that I am sure he will enjoy the feast.

My sister (Pia) doesn’t live here as much anymore. She lives in London. She’s here for the festive celebrations, so I will bake one for her.

It would be Tiger Shroff because we have similar tastes in music and so many other things, too. I will be able to find him a good gift because I know his taste, likes and dislikes. I will gift him a record of George Michael’s Christmas songs.

It has to be Home Alone. It’s a tradition to watch the film every year on the occasion.

The last time we saw Dhairya Karwa was as a Mumbai-based writer in Gehraiyaan (2022). His next, Apurva, largely set in Chambal, is a story that could scare the life out of any city dweller. Director Nikhil Nagesh Bhat’s survival drama follows Tara Sutaria’s titular character as she fights her male assailants after being abducted from a bus. Karwa plays her fiancé who sets out in search of her.

“The only way to survive such [intense] films is to take it a little less seriously. But the subject cannot be [taken lightly]. A film like this reflects generational conditioning,” says the actor.

Karwa is unfazed that the Disney+ Hotstar movie is centred on Sutaria and Abhishek Banerjee’s characters. To him, it was the messaging that mattered. “I knew it’s a great story. When you are starting out, it’s more important to establish the kind of stories that matter to you.”

In the past five years, the actor has featured in Uri: The Surgical Strike (2019) and 83 (2021). After Gehraiyaan, he says he has noticed a shift in opinions about him.

“I got some roles that needed me to shoulder more. I signed two big projects, but they didn’t work out the way [I] had hoped. There was a long gap since my last release because of this. I had to recalibrate [my choices] and that’s when Apurva came my way.”

He will also be seen in Gyaarah Gyaarah soon.

In the past four years, Tara Sutaria admits she has been looking for stories that align with her ideas. Apurva could well be the first film to tick that box. Nikhil Nagesh Bhat’s 24-hour survival drama sees Sutaria as the titular character, who fights assailants after they abduct her from a bus. To her, it’s the story of “a Durga inside every woman.”

“Women possess an innate strength that comes out in the face of adversity. No woman should have to go through this, but as an actor, this role is a privilege,” begins the actor.

After forgettable films in Marjaavaan (2019) and Ek Villain Returns (2022), Sutaria is excited to headline a project. She knows how rare the opportunity is in Bollywood that churns out testosterone-driven films.

“There are so many hero-centric films but women-oriented films are rare. I’m glad the film chose me. I’ve learnt the hard way that if your film doesn’t work, people won’t accept you. I don’t have a Godfather, and in this industry, some guidance always helps. That said, every time I took advice, it backfired. So, I’m left to go with my gut feeling.”

It is this gut feeling that made her say an instant yes to Apurva, also starring Abhishek Banerjee and Dhairya Karwa. The reason was simple—the survival thriller spoke about woman power, an idea that Sutaria stands by, but saw being challenged often in showbiz.

“I grew up in a house that didn’t have gender-specific roles. When I came to this industry, I saw inequality and injustice of gargantuan levels. It has been difficult for me to put my point across in male-heavy rooms. I have been cut short, short of being shut down.”

Apurva will be her game-changer, she tells us. But shooting for the Disney+ Hotstar film in Rajasthan was gruelling. “I was barefoot throughout the shoot in Jaisalmer. I was jumping off trains, walking on hot sand, doing all my stunts without body doubles. I lived on intermittent napping because we were shooting day and night. At one point, I didn’t shower for 10 days. I didn’t brush my hair. I didn’t wash my face. My eyes had mud in them. Headlining a film is a responsibility and I wanted to do my best.”

Kill is having the kind of journey that every filmmaker aspires for his movie. Nikhil Nagesh Bhat’s directorial venture, starring Lakshya Lalwani and Raghav Juyal, premièred at Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), and was recently screened at the Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival. The action fare— think stunts and gore along the lines of John Wick—is entirely shot on a train. The director’s next outing, Apurva, too is a survival tale. So, we begin our chat with the obvious question: what’s with the gore on screen?

“I get that a lot, especially this year. I am told I need to go see a shrink,” he laughs. But Kill was written in 2020 during the pandemic. “I think the stress and insecurities that were pent up, were put on paper.”

Having producers Karan Johar and Guneet Monga Kapoor backing your vision can be a high in itself. The joy is only heightened with the positive reviews at TIFF. But Bhat remains composed, saying, “I’m glad both Kill and Apurva are in good places.”

That Apurva, led by Tara Sutaria and Abhishek Banerjee, is ready to reach the audience must be comforting for Bhat, who spent 14 years searching for collaborators to back the powerful story of a woman fighting male assailants.

“Apurva was written in 2009. I know women are stronger than men. I have seen powerful women all my life—my DA [director’s assistant] is a woman, my creative producer is a woman and has contributed a lot to this film. In Kill, I wanted a woman to do the dialogues. As a writer-director, I acknowledge that I’d never know what a woman goes through.”

Today, he is happy that the Disney+ Hotstar offering has shaped up exactly as he wanted—“uninhibited”. But he clearly remembers how difficult it was, during those 14 years, to pitch the woman-led story to an industry that loves to see male actors as the saviour in narratives.

“The producers, who I first pitched Apurva to, kept saying a hero should come and rescue the girl. Ek hero daal do, they said. But I didn’t want to change the story of a woman trying to save herself. That’s the film I set out to make. When you see a woman fight back, you root for her. People wanted to make it lighter. Some felt it’s not a [mainstream] film, but it is.”