Thaindian News

By Subhash K Jha

Anil Kapoor won’t like this. But Shefali Shah feels she deserved, and got, the National award for her performance in Rituparno Ghosh’s The Last Lear rather than the Anil Kapoor-produced Gandhi My Father. She was nominated for both the performances.

Many felt she should have won it for Feroz Khan’s Gandhi My Father. Shefali disagrees. “It was such an honor to be nominated for two performances. But Last Lear was much more difficult. Playing a real-life character, Kasturba and that too with an emotional and chronological graph that took me from young to old, gave me a lot of space to create my character. In The Last Lear I had to establish my character within a specific setting and a time frame. I think it’s far easier playing older characters.”

Initially her husband was supposed to co-star with her. There’s another guy played by Sumeet Raghavan in Shefali’s character’s life. It was role that Shefali’s husband was supposed to play. “Barnali keenly wanted Vipul to do it. But there was no way he was going to go back to acting after giving it up on stage many years ago,” says the actress.

Kuch Love Jaisa is a love gift from Vipul to his wife who has just won the National award for her performance in Rituparno Ghosh’s The Last Lear.

Right now Shefali is looking forward to the release of Kuch Love Jaisa. “Thankfully I play a character my own age. Though it’s a small film I know Vipul will market it like any of his other films.”

-Sampurn Media