Actress Preeti Jhangiani, who was recently seen in Kafas, gets candid with The Pioneer about donning the hat of a producer, the switch of film sets over the years, and more.
SHIKHA DUGGAL
We saw so many television celebrities with taped faces in recent times — with half the energy and passion—and the Kafas movie team made this a success. Very well, this was a marketing idea! In the thick of it, there was also the appearance of the actress Preeti Jhangiani, the one who was conceivably auld lang syne.
Not exactly, because her turning up was felt by the viewers! In an exclusive conversation with us about the spoken-about television series, she ignites, “If I wouldn’t have done that music video with Rajashri music label, it could be that I wouldn’t have been an actress today. During the nineties, it became fervent. Now I can see a fair amount of actresses voicing their anecdotes of career breaks, but strangely, I never felt like I was away from films at all. Throughout these years, I was in touch with my admirers. I was part of shows and events and donned the hat of a producer for the time being.”
She established that the film sets have switched tremendously. According to her, “The cast and crew are way more professional than the early 2000s now. What hasn’t changed are the working styles of YRF, Aditya Chopra, and Nadiadwala. Hitherto, their films have been implemented with impressive cinema. Once an actor, always an actor! I hope for many of my contemporaries to return to the big screens; there is still space for you to reconnoitre as an actor here. I have watched audiences pining for those actors, the ones who were known for their unquestionable calibre.”
She was working on a touchy subject, and like the other cast members, “Even I didn’t know what Kafas conveyed. Because the original title had to be Dark Money. It turns out the existing title was meant to be a cage, and its significance became stronger then. I could equate myself with the theme because there was a time, unexpectedly, when I felt everything was goody-two-shoes. But the mankind of today is self-absorbed, as it may be.”
She is unfazed by the “star wife” label. In fact, they have been in the public eye more than ever since they got married. But over the years, we saw how both of them created their own niche in the industry, but to the boot, “I don’t make crosses with this label, and sometimes, my husband experiences conversely, and I never saw him feeling exasperated too. Both of us are self-made actors in this industry! Quite the opposite, life in this environment has been merrier because he understands my profession. It comes with a lot of unsaid understandings!”
Unfortunately, in bad faith, like many of the stars of this industry, even she was bamboozled into a facade that she didn’t mean to: “I remember putting on a lot of weight after the birth of my children, and it didn’t go down well with the netizens. I was trolled mercilessly! I had to put on a show and try to be somebody else for the media. I was going through a very stressful time, especially as an actress. The pressure was doubled on me. So is my character in Kafas — my director always had to pull me back from being too filmy and overtly dramatic. Most of it was coming from the movies I was simultaneously shooting in the south, so my expressions turned out to be loud on the monitor for a streaming platform. I had to stop being theatrical for once.” Her family is totally non-filmy; they couldn’t connect to the glamour world initially, but Preeti had already begun her binge, beginning with the South films. The ensemble cast has always been the arduous turf for her; she contends with the presence of producers and the clashing dates between the cast members, but she has always applauded the way films are represented, taking their own time.
