Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Adil Hussain, who plays Pi’s Gujarati dad in Life Of Pi,shares the experience of shooting with Ang Lee and also why he’s apprehensive about the film’s release

Scared of matching up to Tabu, Irrfan and Ang: Adil

Adil Hussain, who plays Pi’s Gujarati dad in Life Of Pi,shares the experience of shooting with Ang Lee and also why he’s apprehensive about the film’s release

    Currently, Adil Hussain’s resume boasts of 12-odd films, including English Vinglish and Ishqiya, but there’s one thing that stands out in it and that’s a movie called Life Of Pi directed by the Oscarwinner, Ang Lee. And, this is the one that’s giving Hussain sleepless nights.
    When asked how he feels about being part of one of the most anticipated movies of the year, Adil says, “I am a little apprehensive. I saw ten minutes of the film and my jaw was hanging open. Someone had to literally come and tell me, ‘Close your jaw’. It was so vivid and real, I have never seen anything like this before. Not even Avatar. I’m apprehensive because I hope that I have done justice to my bit. There’s Ang Lee, who’s won an Oscar twice, and there’s Irrfan who’s a great actor, and Tabu, who’s a fine actor, and Suraj, who is phenomenal. Rest every department is the finest cream of the film industry around the world. So I wonder, if I’ve matched up to that. I am a 12-film-old actor — I am still getting a hang of the medium.”
    Adil, who originally hails from a small town in Assam, says he underwent accent training before taking on the role of Pi’s Gujarati dad, Santosh Patel. He speaks permanently in that accent now and seems quite amused by it, saying, “I have never spoken this way before in my life!”
    He says that Ang is one of the most humble people he’s ever met. “I saw three of his films before I met him. I saw Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. The genre of the movie was martial arts, and for somebody to take martial arts to such heights — it was amazing. I was totally awed by his work! So when I met him the first time in Bombay. No airs. He could’ve been a person I know, maybe in my village in Assam, who sells vegetables. You know, that kind of politeness and humility that those people have... a lot of affection and love — which is phenomenal,” he exclaims.
    The sets he worked on were phenomenal. He continues, “The second largest city in Taiwan is Taichung and the aiport of that city had been abandoned for a high-speed train that had been recently introduced. So the airport was our production office. The hangars were our studios and in the entire space in an around the runway, there was a huge construction containing water. There was a lifesize ship. I have never seen anything this big. And also meticulous. Everything was very contained.”
    Adil, however happy as he may be for Ang and the ‘Oscar buzz’ that the movie’s generating, balks at the idea of ‘plans’. When you ask him what his future plans are, he says, “I have no plans to go anywhere. I feel that wherever I have to go, the road will find me. That’s what has happened till now. I feel that things just happen. I just would like to act. I love acting. It’s not a job, it’s my way of life. If I don’t have films, I do theatre. When I don’t do theatre, I teach acting. Things are coming to me and I am so grateful for that and the way it is happening.”
    Life of Pi, produced by Fox Star Studios, releases in 3D & 2D on November 23.