Tabu: ‘We don’t repeat our dynamics’

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First, a hit in Crew, then bagging the role of Sister Francesca in Dune: Prophecy, and now Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha - clearly Tabu is having one hell of a year. When we tell her that, the actor laughs, saying, "I don't set out with the ambition of proving a point with any film. I go into a project thinking, ‘How will I be interesting?' I want to enjoy what I'm doing. I want either a cutting-edge film that gives me something different experientially, or sometimes I want to do regular, predictable [stories]. Crew came to me when I was doing Drishyam 2 [2022] and Bholaa [2023]. So, I wanted a break from that zone."

Crew, starring Kareena Kapoor Khan and Kriti Sanon alongside her, has proven that a film doesn't need a hero for it to run to packed houses. Its success has given hope to filmmakers to develop more women-led stories. "Not everyone can make a Crew. It was a combination of story, casting, and marketing. But if a few people are encouraged to make films with women [leading them] because of Crew's success, it is heartening. It speaks volumes about the conviction of the makers, Rhea Kapoor and Ektaa R Kapoor. Rhea always believed it would be a Rs 100-crore film. I look at success differently. But she wanted to make a statement and was able to."

Now, Tabu is reuniting with one of her oldest friends, Ajay Devgn, in Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha. The romantic drama marks their tenth film together. What's the secret to their enduring chemistry? "When we say yes to a film, the story means something to us. You can't define good chemistry. We don't feed off each other's energies. But we don't repeat our dynamics. In some films, we're pitted against each other; in others, we're romantically paired. There is freshness to the casting. In this film, what works is that audiences have seen us together for so many years. To them, it's believable that these two people haven't met in a long time. People tend to believe that Ajay and I are two people in love, who couldn't meet and are meeting after eons."

The drama is her first collaboration with director Neeraj Pandey. She says that he has a knack for moulding his actors beautifully. "He will mould you in every take, with the brief he gives you. By the third take, he will want you to reimagine your approach. He'll say, ‘Let's try it with a smile.'"