CHENNAI : The actor-politican on reuniting with the Superstar in their Deepavali release, her completing 40 years in films, and why dance will always be an integral part of cinema
I ask Khushbu if she would have traded off the temple her fans built for her with better roles in films. She laughs at the question, but answers almost instantly. “No,” she says, “I would have definitely preferred the temple. If not for the temple, you wouldn’t be sitting here and asking me questions.”
One might have to agree with her. Khushbu the star, is bigger than Khushbu the actress. She was the go-to heroine of the ‘90s. During that decade, she sometimes acted in over 10 films in a single year. That was probably enough to become a household name, an adjective for idli, and of course, the temple. Understandably, she values adoration more than awards.
Stardom is what she sought too. She had a taste of it very early. She was 10 when she debuted in BR Chopra’s The Burning Train (1981). The film had Dharmendra, Hema Malini, Vinod Khanna, Parveen Babi, Jeetendra, Neetu Kapoor, Vinod Mehra, Navin Nischol and Danny Denzogpa. Going forward, she appeared in Bollywood till the late ‘80s, until she shifted predominantly to Tamil films. She grew up with the stars; it was natural that she wanted to become one as well.
https://77a1eac616ea941dd3b6fc5d5c0eb6e1.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html After sparkling through the ‘90s, the number of films reduced in the 2000s. Khushbu forayed into television, plunged into politics and had to take care of her children. She hardly appeared on the big screen after 2010. Today, even on smaller screens, we mostly see her as a politician.
This year though, there will be a change. She will be in the Rajinikanth-starrer Annaathe (she does not want to call it a ‘comeback’ though). Khushbu will also be one of the judges in Colors Tamil’s reality show, Dance vs Dance Season 2.
In an interview, the actor-politician talks about her four-decade-old film career, reuniting with Rajinikanth in Annaatthe, the significance of dance in Tamil movies and more.
Excerpts:
Congratulations on completing four decades in films!
Thank you. It’s been a roller-coaster ride, and I think that’s why I loved every bit of it. If not for the ups and downs, I might have easily gotten disinterested.
In this journey, you have been a child artist, a female lead, show host, reality TV judge, producer, politician… which of these roles were your favourite?
Being a mother. That has been my most favorite role. I didn’t know anything except films and television. So this is what my life has been. Now, of course, I have become a politician. I had to cut down on films and TV because politics requires a lot of time and attention. And I look forward to being better at it.
You’re a judge on a dance reality show now. In the 80s and 90s, almost every Tamil movie had a dance number. It’s not the case now. Do you think dance could slowly fade out of mainstream cinema?
Dance in cinema is never going to fade away; it’s part and parcel of cinema. We have had people like Vyjayanthimala ji and Puppy ma (Padmini). The generation just before me had excellent dancers like Jaya Prada, Jayasudha, Sridevi, Sripriya akka. I was a huge fan of Ambika’s dancing.
After my generation, there have been a lot of good dancers too. You need to know how to dance; you can’t have two left feet and say ‘I want to be a great actress.’ Yes, maybe in an OTT film, you might not need to dance. But to at least emote on screen, you need to have a sense of rhythm. But unless you know what music is about, what dancing is about, you cannot even take two steps into acting.-The HINDU
