July 7th, 2011

Nazneen – Interview (II)

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A Delhi magazine recently put Nazneen in its list of ten most beautiful women. A photographer friend, she says, sent a picture of hers off and that was that. And looking at all the photographs published, she grinned, she couldn’t quite see how everyone was that beautiful. She’s a person of good nature, without vanity.

Nazneen has that very Moghul look and a complexion crying aloud to be put in a soap ad. An advertising agency is planning to do just that. Though Nazneen doesn’t really use that particular brand of soap. But neither does Sanjeev Kumar really use that particular brand of cigarette, does he?

She called for a glass of something called Tang and drank it off. It’s made abroad—orange juice, vitamins and minerals. “I can eat or drink anything and not put on weight,” she said. In fact, far from dieting she found herself sometimes swallowing tablets to put on weight. Her family thought she was skinny. In Muslim homes, they like their girls to grow plump. Nazneen thought she was all right — anyway, when you were flashed on to the movie screen, she said knowledgeably, you came out looking some 25 per cent bigger than you really were.

On the screen, wearing a sari (her preferred costume off-screen too), Nazneen tends to look somewhat older than she really is. This day, in white ‘salwar’ and ‘kurta’ she looked quite school- girlish and cool, which seems her favourite state of mind too. Her nose is pierced and she wore a little diamond screw — it’s becoming ”in” again with the younger crowd, she said. Her hair has a brown sheen when the sun­light catches it. Her eyes are brown, too, though what she really admires are Sarika’s eyes, so green. In fact, Naz­neen said, Sarika looks such a doll you hesitate to touch her for fear of hurting her.

One young actress Naz­neen met quite early in life was Neetu Singh. In fact, the two went to the same school. Sometimes, Nazneen said, Neetu would invite her to step into her mother’s flat for lunch. Neither of them then thought they would turn actresses.

A photograph of Nazneen’s on the mantlepiece, her hair upswept, makes her resemble Madhubala, one of the older stars she admires. Another is Meena Kumari. Nazneen was very hurt when she read a reader’s letter in a fan magazine saying some unsavoury things about Meena Kurnari. It’s too late in the day to try and “im­prove” our film journals but, Nazneen asked, “Why pub­lish things like this? Did Meena Kumari harm anyone except herself? We should remember  only her good performances.” On the other hand, Nazneen thought some film journalists today were excellent craftsmen. With­out sarcasm at all, she said, “Often they’ve to make something out of nothing. They do it very well.”

Sharmila Tagore, Nazneen thought, was a super actress, “with every little gesture of hers. And she’s smart. I like people who are smart.”

Normally, Nazneen can’t stand a man whose chest doesn’t show hair. There was something creepy about a hairless masculine chest.. But she has made an exception with Charles Bronson.

Nazneen has a boyfriend from the world of films but is coy about giving his name. Among her current films is “Khuda ki Kasam” which has Lekh Tandon as director and Vinod Khanna as leading man. This is suppos­ed to be a film Vinod will do before his ”retirement”.

Recently, O. P. Ralhan has signed Nazneen for the fe­male lead of “Pyaas”, a film he is planning to do before starting on his big produc­tion “Ashoka”. It isn’t just because he has given her the role but Nazneen likes Ral­han’s dash and style, the way he dresses — “all that a showman should be.”

Maybe why Nazneen isn’t seen more frequently in films is because everyone thinks of her just as the leading man’s or leading lady’s sweet little kid sister. Always the bride’s maid, never the bride sort of thing. Nazneen in fact stands ready for a little more share of the limelight. Not that she’s terribly ambitious. She wants to do a few good roles—she doesn’t care if the world isn’t going to call her the greatest actress that ever lived.

Nazneen sent for a “paan”. “I don’t know why, I take it with tobacco these days,” she said.

During Rarnzan, she ob­served a rigorous fast — she would have neither coffee nor even a glass of water that we offered her when she dropped in at Filmfare’s office. But the way she chirp­ed away, nobody could have imagined she had been starving. (As told to K.N. Subramaniam in 1978)

Interviews