Pooja turned producer with Tamanna in 1998 and later took up film direction with Paap in 2003. PHOTO: FILE
MUMBAI:
It has been over a decade since Pooja Bhatt was seen on the big screen as an actor. She says she is open to the idea of facing the camera again — as long as she gets to act her age.
Pooja first turned producer with Tamanna in 1998. Later, she took up film direction with Paap in 2003.
“I would like to act my age. I am proud to be 40 because I have survived till 40 with my soul intact. I don’t think there are many people who have survived their business like that,” said Pooja.
“So, I would like to play women of my age on screen. If somebody can accommodate my girth and my mirth in a role, then I am your woman. I am not going to go historical, go under the knife and starve myself for three months because of a role – no chance,” she added.
Pooja, who became a popular actor in the ‘90s with movies like Dil Hai Ki Manta Nahin, Sir, Border and Zakhm, credits her film-maker father Mahesh Bhatt for what she has achieved.
“Mahesh Bhatt was the man who had the eye to see what other people never saw. But with me, on day one, he said, ‘Pooja Bhatt, if you are not going to be good I am going to throw you out. I am not going to lie that you can act when the fact is that you can’t act’,” she said.
“That was the greatest gift my father gave me on day one and I was thrown into the deep end. That is when you learn to swim,” she said.
Pooja’s last hit film as an actor was Zakhm, released in 1998.
The actor moved away from the arc lights at a young age and she says the reason was that she couldn’t focus on herself anymore.
“An actor is meant to be selfish. He is only meant to think about himself or herself because the film industry is a very unforgiving place, where nobody is there to help the actor. So you have to focus on yourself,” Pooja added.
“I never had a desire to be an actor, but when I decided to be an actor I had two routes — one was to go the stardom way, but I wanted credibility as an artist as well,” she said. “I wanted people to say ‘she can act’. I didn’t want to be a star and then learn to act after five to six years.”
As a film producer, she has delivered projects like Dushman, Zakhm, Jism and Jism 2.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 27th, 2012.
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