The actress on playing a real-life Brit secret agent in Emmy Award-winning director Lydia Dean Pilcher’s espionage drama
Akash Bhatnagar (MUMBAI MIRROR; July 27, 2019)

After making her Hollywood debut with The Wedding Guest last year, Radhika Apte is now gearing up for Liberte: A Call To Spy which premiered at the Edinburgh International Film Festival last month. The espionage drama, directed by Emmy award-winner Lydia Dean Pilcher, has the actress playing Noor Inayat Khan. Describing her character as “a pacifist fighting in the war”, Radhika informs that she was a Brit born in Russia to an American mother and an Indian Muslim father who was into Sufism, and raised in France.

During World War II, Noor who was part of Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s secret organisation was sent to France as a spy and operated under the name of Madeleine. She was caught but did not reveal secrets, and died, her last word being, “Liberte.”

Radhika met Lydia at the Tribeca Film festival in 2015. The latter was on the jury and she’d won the best actress award for Clean Shaven, part of the anthological film Madly. “Lydia told me that she was casting for this film,” she recalls, admitting a lot has been written on Noor, including stories by her children and material from secret services. “With Lydia’s help, I was able to find a balance between all the information and finding the character,” she says.

The actress points out that when we talk about wars, we only speak about the men. “But there were so many women who fought just as valiantly. Lydia feels very strongly for them and wants to tell their untold stories,” she adds, agreeing that while we’ve seen many films on the World Wars, they always felt distant despite being directly related to India’s Independence struggle in many ways. “I never thought I’d get an opportunity to portray someone involved with a World War. Being on the set of Liberte, wearing those costumes, was an experience.”

Prod her on differences between our industry and the West and she quips, “People there are more professional in terms of punctuality, be it coming for a shoot or paying your dues.”

Radhika hints to an announcement for another international film but is waiting to sign it first. Meanwhile, she’s been embroiled in a controversy over a leaked scene with Dev Patel from The Wedding Guest. She clears the air, saying, “I never gave any interview in this matter” and adds with a laugh, “How many times is the audience going to get surprised by my nudity?”
-------------------------
Dhaval Roy (DNA; July 27, 2019)

It’s cloak and dagger time for Radhika Apte as she is all set to be seen in Liberte: A Call to Spy. Based on true incidents from World War II, the Hollywood project has the AndhaDhun star essaying the role of a British spy, Noor Inayat Khan aka Nora Baker, who was the first female wireless operator to parachute into Nazi-occupied France to help the French Resistance.

Needless to say, to portray her part, Radhika had to do big-time research and rehearsals. The actress shares, “I believe that preparing for a character includes almost all aspects of acquiring knowledge — information about the subject, reading up extensively about the story in question and even related stories that influence my character, balancing out the visceral side of her, so on and so forth.” Hence, she pored over a number of classic novels and watched spy flicks to get into the skin and psyche of the character. “A lot of reading material was passed onto me by writers and producers on-board,” she adds.

As for the difference between the process of filmmaking in the two industries, she says it’s an extremely subjective process. “I think every director and production house has their own way of working.” However, she did notice two things that set Indian and international filmmaking apart. “People are very punctual there. And they pay you on time. You don’t have to beg them for money.”

A source also tells us that apart from Philadelphia, where the production designers recreated England, the team also filmed in Budapest, where Radhika has visited as a tourist in the past. “She had a great time while working there as well,” the insider said.

Radhika Apte speaks up on #MeToo movement and believes that it needs to be handled in a constructive manner
Natasha Coutinho (MUMBAI MIRROR; October 23, 2018)

You have always been open about sexual harassment and had slapped a South actor who tried to touch you inappropriately in the past. What is your take on the #MeToo movement that has led to many women outing other predators?
I’m very pleased people are calling out sexual harassment, it’s high time this happened. It’s coming out in an explosive way but it’s just the tip of the iceberg. There’s a lot of more s**t out there. I’m hoping we come up with a constructive way of dealing with it It’s also important to be fair. This is a tricky one because it’s a sensitive subject. Sexual abuse shouldn’t be happening at any workplace or even in personal life. The kind of things that are coming out should not be tolerated. Period.

Your last release, Sriram Raghavan’s thriller AndhaDhun also featuring Ayushmann Khurrana and Tabu, is a certified hit. You played was a new age girl, Sophie, with a mind of her own and a really chic look.
Isn’t it wonderful the film’s doing so well! And we didn’t even publicise that film much. AndhaDhun’s success is a perfect example that if a film is good, it will run. I love Sriram’s work, we had done Badlapur three years ago and I’m glad I did this film even if I had a small part.

Talking about looks, in mainstream cinema sometimes the look makes perfect sense and other times you don’t understand why we are dressing up so much. Fortunately, I’ve grown up on a diet of Bollywood films so it’s not difficult to visualise these looks. It’s a good thing when you get to dress smart but believe me, it’s tough wearing six-inch heels all day!

After 13 years in the industry, how was it like pairing up with a debutant, the late Vinod Mehra’s son, Rohan, in Baazaar.
He’s one of the most hardworking and sincere people I’ve met. And since he’s travelled around the world and has different hobbies, there was lots to talk about. My character, Priya, is an ambitious girl who can go to any lengths to get what she wants. Yet at the same time there’s a certain vulnerability about her triggered off by her dilemma over what’s right and wrong which makes it interesting.

Do you dabble in the stock market in real life?
I’m clueless. During the shoot I would even blank out on the information fed to me. But Rohan is very knowledgeable about stocks and shares and I would go ask him. (Laughs) It would embarrass him, and he’d ask me to not tell anyone.

On the film front you have two international projects, The Wedding Guest with Dev Patel and the Lydia Dean Pilcher directed World War II spy drama along with Stana Katic and Sarah Megan Thomas. What’s the status quo on them?
I have completed both films. Lydia’s film is yet untitled, while The Wedding Guest premiered at the Toronto Film Festival (TIFF). But sorry, got to be tight-lipped on details.

Touted as the web world’s blue-eyed girl, Radhika Apte says she yearns for more work since her acclaimed shows have only seen her play second fiddle
Sonil Dedhia (MID-DAY; September 26, 2018)

Three consecutive Netflix offerings later, Radhika Apte is set to return to the big screen with AndhaDhun. Giving her nod to Sriram Raghavan’s thriller, which revolves around a blind protagonist’s run- in with the law, she says, was a no-brainer. “He can call me anytime and tell me to do a film. I’ll blindly say yes,” she says of the director, who she credits for creating unpredictable plot lines. “The way he scripts his films is crazy. He inspires [his artistes], which is amazing.”

Having featured in web shows like Lust Stories, Sacred Games and Ghoul, Apte is evidently being touted as the digital world’s lucky charm. Yet, the actor doesn’t take her success seriously. She argues, her roles in the acclaimed shows were bit-sized. “I was part of one segment [of the four-part anthology film] Lust Stories. I played a small part in Sacred Games. Ghoul was the only show that saw me in the lead. If I was running the three shows, I would have felt a different kind of high. So, there is a lot more to do. I don’t feel satisfied at all.”

Yet, what she has on offer are projects that many in the industry would yearn for. She talks about English filmmaker Michael Winterbottom’s The Wedding Guest, and American producer Lydia Dean Pilcher’s untitled female-driven World War II spy drama, with palpable excitement. “Only few Asian actresses get to play lead roles in non-Indian films. We rarely get the opportunity to be cast in them. I have got the taste [of such success], but I want more.”

Speaking to mid-day at the launch of True Roots Botanical Hair Tonic, the actor reveals that a second edition of her horror, Ghoul, is likely to roll. “The subtext allows for a second season. But, it is the makers who would know if that’s possible.”