A fresh start for Esha with "Darling"

After two consecutive flops at the box-office – "Just Married" and "Cash", Esha Deol has high expectations from "Darling", the twenty-fifth film of her career. It was the first time that she worked with Ram Gopal Varma and the experience has left her reinvigorated. Add to that, she is playing a ghost for the first time.

"The film is full of adventure and romance. Everyone would like to watch it. There's Isha Koppikar with me in the film. But I believe people would enjoy my character more than hers," Esha raved. In the movie, Esha is Geeta, the secretary of a corporate honcho played by Fardeen Khan. He always tries to romance her and one day he kills her. Geeta's spirit then returns to her boss's house to accomplish all the work she had left half-done. "I had no make-up playing Geeta. And anyways, make-up doesn't go well with me," Esha explained.

"I'm much affected by working with Ramuji. I have done scenes in the film that I had never thought of doing before. I have developed my acting talent. I would like to do more films with him," said Esha. Working with RGV was also a big relief after her "Cash" experience. When the "Dhoom" girl had signed the movie, she was all excited about it, but during the shooting itself she couldn't understand what Anubhav Sinha was up to. Finally, when she saw the film on the screen she was completely shocked. Esha recalled: ""Cash" is one film that I just cannot forget. I thought it would give a boost to my career. Instead, the director turned it into a worthless movie. There were some scenes that I could not even understand. The story is about a diamond, and yet, you don't know who gets it in the end. Directors should know what shape the movie would take. So, one cannot put the responsibility on actors when they ruin the project."

Post-"Cash", it took time for the actress to calm down ruffled nerves. "The first two or three days after a film flops are really painful for the actors. Then we decide not to do anything similar again. I'm now much conscious about selecting my films. Besides reading the script carefully, I also check out who the director is. I'm going to work with film-makers like Ramuji only. However, at times even good movies fail to do well at the box-office."

On her part, as an actor, Esha is ready to glam up as much as needed for the character despite avoiding such an image in real life. She said: "It's my duty to portray the character properly. If such is the demand of the character, I have no objection to wearing glamorous dresses. My character in "Dhoom" is one such example."

As of now, Esha has her hands full with interesting assignments. She is in the lead role opposite Shiney Ahuja in "Hijacked", with Tusshar Kapoor in "One Two Three", in a love story by Mahesh Bhatt titled "Jannat" and Rohit Shetty's "Golmaal Returns". She was previously offered "Golmaal" but couldn't accept it.

Hope this is a fresh start for Esha with umpteen opportunities waiting at her doorstep to reach her to Bollywood's top league.

-(SAMPURN)