Our last brush with Vidya Balan was the joyful Shakuntala Devi (2020), where she played the gregarious math genius with aplomb. Almost a year on, the exuberance has been replaced with an air of reticence, the teasing tone, by measured words, as Balan transforms into Vidya Vincent, the quiet forest officer in Sherni. For the actor, the world of the Amit Masurkar-directed film comes as a breath of fresh air.  

“Playing a forest officer was refreshing because it’s a world I am not familiar with. My interaction with this world [was through] a few safaris, and watching Animal Planet and NatGeo,” she shares.

The more she read up on forest officers, the more she understood the demanding nature of the job. “I met a few forest officers to understand what their job entails. It was an eye-opener. They have to undergo an intense three-year course before they make the cut. When one gets a wildlife posting, they are cut off from civilization, living in a parallel reality and are most probably away from their families. The job can be physically arduous and dangerous at times, so [the field] was traditionally male-dominated. But the women officers shared how they negotiated their way around the patriarchal mindset.”

While the Amazon Prime Video offering puts the focus squarely on the man-animal conflict, it also studies how a woman has to fight harder to survive in what is considered a male domain. “I like that Vidya Vincent is a woman of few words and yet has the courage to stand up for what she believes in. You don’t have to be aggressive or be a man in a man’s world; you can be a woman and still find your way.”

The drama was largely shot in Balaghat, Madhya Pradesh. Filming in the dense jungles was an experience of a lifetime for Balan. “I have been on safaris in the past, but the wild would always intimidate me. But this time around, I stayed in a tent, which was fun. I would go for long walks in the summer when it was safe. It was heartening to see how the unit was conscious not to litter around as we were shooting in a forest.”

Vidya Balan had her brush with shooting in the post-COVID world as she filmed a brand commercial in August (Vidya in work mode, August 31). Now, the actor is set to step up the game as she readies for her first film shoot post the pandemic. With the team of Sherni slated to kick off a 35-day schedule in Balaghat, Madhya Pradesh, by the last week of October, the makers have roped in an agency to monitor the safety measures adopted on set.

A source close to the production unit reveals that while the cast and crew will fly down to Nagpur to head to the final destination, road transportation has been arranged for certain unit hands who will be required to carry equipment. "A team of five to six members, who will serve as COVID-19 watchdogs, will be present on set every day to ensure that the crew is following all safety norms. Besides the government's guidelines, the health experts will lay down additional Coronavirus risk-management protocol. These experts are part of a professional agency that has monitored several ad shoots over the past few months. Even as they aim to achieve a zero-incident shoot, the makers have created isolation centres for asymptomatic people, on the recommendation of the experts," says the source.

The Amit Masurkar-led team will adopt the bio-bubble mode of shoot, and will be put up at five-star hotels in Gondia, which is an hour's drive away from the jungles of Balaghat. The source adds, "The producers have booked The Taj Gateway and The Grand Sita in entirety. They have also blocked banquets and restaurants in these hotels, thus making sure that the team does not come in contact with outsiders."

Producer Vikram Malhotra is glad to take the drama — which sees Balan play a forest officer — on floors after a seven-month break. "Extensive safety and healthcare measures are being put in place to ensure the well-being of the entire crew," he says.

With almost 65 per cent of Sherni shoot remaining, Vidya Balan to kick off extensive schedule in October in Balaghat
Mohar Basu (MID-DAY; August 4, 2020)

The shoot of Vidya Balan's Sherni had come to an abrupt halt in mid-March as the country went under a lockdown to curb the spread of the Coronavirus pandemic. Almost five months later, the Amit Masurkar-led team is steadily charting out a plan to take the movie on floors by the first week of October.

"The next location is Balaghat; we will be filming in the jungles of Madhya Pradesh. The safety of the cast and crew is key, which is why we have waited for so many months to resume work. The number of cases is reducing, but the nature of the menace is such that we need to have our guards up," explains producer Vikram Malhotra, adding that about 65 per cent of the shoot is remaining. The makers have procured the necessary permission to conduct an extensive schedule in the state. "The authorities facilitating production in Madhya Pradesh have assured me that the area is safe to shoot in. Internally, we will follow the strictest guidelines of health and safety."

If things had gone as per the original plan, the social drama would have been wrapped up by May. The producer recounts how three weeks into their first schedule in Bhopal, the team had to be hurriedly brought back to Mumbai. "In the early days of the crisis, we had little information on how to practise safety measures. As the producer, the first thing we did was to protect the daily-wage workers in the unit. We made sure there was no income displacement. Everyone on contract was paid till the first week of May."

On her part, Vidya Balan — who reportedly plays a forest officer keen on resolving the man-animal conflict — is raring to go back to work. Emphasising that she has been home-bound for almost five months, she says, "I am excited, not scared. Fear won't help much, all we can do is be as careful as possible and move forward."

The actress’s next, on man-animal conflict, being shot in the forests of Madhya Pradesh
Avinash Lohana (MUMBAI MIRROR; March 5, 2020)

After Jagan Shakti’s 2019 multi-starrer, Mission Mangal, Vidya Balan kicked off her next, Sherni, on Wednesday, March 4, in Bhoot Palasi in Madhya Pradesh. Directed by Newton director Amit Masurkar, the film features the actress as a forest officer. “I loved Newton and when Amit narrated Sherni to me, I knew I wanted to do this film. The uniqueness of the story and its world appealed to me,” informs the National Award-winning actress.

According to a source close to the production, the drama has strong humorous undertones with Vidya’s character, along with a team of dedicated officers and forest guards, trying to find a solution to the man-animal conflict depicted in the film, while tracing her own journey. “Most of the film will be shot in the dense forests of Bhoot Palasi and Balaghat, along with other locations in the state,” informs the source.

The film, produced by Bhushan Kumar, Vikram Malhotra and Amit, rolled on March 2 and will be shot in a start-to-finish schedule. It is expected to wrap up by April-end and also features Vijay Raaz, Sharat Saxena and Ila Arun.

Newton (2017) bagged the National Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi and was India’s entry to the Best Foreign Language Film category at the Oscars. It centred on a government clerk, played by Rajkummar Rao, who is on election duty in a conflict-ridden jungle of Central India. “The story of Sherni is one that needs to be told. I am happy to be working with Vidya Balan, one of the finest actors and human beings in the industry,” Amit asserts.