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Imtiaz and Ayesha Dharker shudder at Page 3 culture
‘We are not celebrities!’
Photo: Bhagya Prakash k.
Visual cues Ayesha and Imitiaz Dharkar worry about the environment in which children are growing up now
Artist, documentary film-maker and poet Imtiaz Dharker was in Bangalore to release her latest collection of poems and drawings “The Terrorist at My Table” brought out by Penguin Books India, that daughter and actress Ayesha Dharker read f
rom, at Landmark. Mother and daughter live across the street from each other in London but Ayesha is busy travelling the world on her shoots.
Ayesha, the stunning and talented actress who made her mark in a gamut of international films and theatre productions has been acting since she was eight. She shot to fame with her critically acclaimed performance in Santosh Sivan’s “The Terrorist” (where she played a suicide bomber) and her phenomenal role in Andrew Loyd Webber’s Broadway show “Bombay Dreams”.
Imtiaz’s poetic journey has taken her through books like “Purdah”, “Postcards from God”, “I Speak for the Devil” and in “The Terrorist…” she talks of world we live in now listening to news everyday of wars, attacks and bombings, and how we are in a phase of disconnect with the people around us. As they sit down to talk, BHUMIKA K. makes the mistake of asking them about their celebrity lives. Mother and daughter rebuff any
suggestions of being celebrities, show utter disapproval of the celebrity and Page 3 culture in the country, and then go on to speak of childhoods and lives marred by the context of the current world. Excerpts:
Ayesha: While doing this whole book launch, we were thinking there’s this tendency now for everything to be Page 3! What has surprised me is that we haven’t had that kind of response to our reading. I have a knee-jerk reac
tion to this celebrity business…why would anyone care about my yoga regimen or what kind of handbag I recommend or carry.
Imtiaz: See, we are just doing our work. We don’t see ourselves as celebrities. For both of us there are things we just have to do. We make our own choices in that. It’s actually quite terrible that when you ask a 12-year-o
ld today “What do you want to be?” the kid says: “I want to be famous.”
Ayesha: Today it worries me when celebrity is a tag. I don’t see myself as one. My job is not to be a celebrity. My job is to act.
Imtiaz: And mine is to write…and it’s so heartening to see people coming out to listen to poetry.
Ayesha: You know, it actually reminds me of the time when people told me that nobody will watch my film “The Terrorist” directed by Santosh Sivan. People told me it will be screened at three in the morning on TV... (laughs)
Imtiaz: And it will be watched by five people… (laughs)
Ayesha: And then when we went to Toronto for the film’s opening, we were heading for a screening and on the way saw a long winding queue. Santosh and me were saying “I wish we would have such a long queue for our film”
;. We went further and discovered that the queue was actually for our film!
Imtiaz: It’s the same way people tell me poetry is dead, and no one’s listening to poetry. But in India there are enough people writing and listening to poetry. The real things in life that matter are going on. And are happ
ening quietly.
Children grow up in vicious environments today
Imtiaz: I remember during the Bombay riots, we had stopped at a petrol bunk…
Ayesha: A young man, possibly one of the rioters was running away from the police…
Imtiaz: And an equally young policeman chasing him aimed his gun through our car just past Ayesha at him. We are dealing with our own wars every day at our doorsteps. And we’re having to deal with it as adults and children.
Ayesha: Also that for today’s kids, you make your own facts from disparate sources rather than one point of view. Your TV is where your grandma used to be.
Kids adapt to what they are given and absorb. When I was growing up if someone said Kabul, I would have thought of Tagore’s Kabuliwala. These are not just war zones; these are places with a history.
Imtiaz: (L
ooking adoringly at her daughter). My! You tell it all better than me! You should have written my book. You’re not a dumb actress!
Ayesha: (L
aughing uncontrollably and getting into histrionics) I do a pretty good impression of a person with a brain. But after that it’s all over… (still giggling, changes her voice to a dumb blonde imitation ) &
#8220;Oh my God, can I have my cookie now? I’m hungry.” (both burst again into peals of laughter)
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