MAYBE THE SABBATICAL WAS PROMPTED BY A CERTAIN STORM CREATED BY SCORNING THE QUEEN BEE, EKTA KAPOOR. CANDID, REAL AND INSTANTLY LIKEABLE, MONA WASU IS BACK WITH A BANG AND LOOKING FABULOUS AT THAT!
HAVING LOST POUNDS OF CHUBBINESS, ADDING TO THE ALREADY PRETTY CURLS FRAMING HER FACE; MONA HAS TWO NEW SHOWS IN HER KITTY. JAMEGI JODI.COM ON 9X, AND NDTV IMAGINE'S RADHA KI BETIYAN KUCH KAR DIKHAYENGI, BOTH ROLES BEING REFRESHINGLY DIFFERENT FROM EACH OTHER AND ALSO FROM THE MEMORABLE IMAGE OF TOMBOYISH MIILEE. ALL GEARED UP AND EXCITED, SHE TELLS US ABOUT HER DISAPPEARING ACT, HER ATTEMPT AT ENTERING THE WORLD OF FILMS AND EVERYTHING ELSE HAPPENING IN HER LIFE IN THE MIDST OF IT ALL…
ST: How is life after Miilee?
MW: I did a lot of chilling then. I had to take that time off because I had to break the mould that I had in Miilee. It became so strong a character that the audience was not prepared to see me in something completely different like a feminine or girlish role, after the bindaas Miilee. I had to wait for the right kind of role, something completely opposite. Everything that was being offered bordered around Miilee.
ST: What are your new ventures?
MW: I got that chance with Radha Ki Betiyan…and Jamegi… In the first one, I play the eldest of three daughters and Supriya Pilgaonkar plays our mother. It is a story about their journey from a small town to a city in pursuit of their individual ambitions, and their collective dream as a family of buying a house. This is something I too can relate to, me being from Delhi and having faced these small challenges that instil confidence into you as you conquer them. The second show is a light comedy wherein I play a traditional sari clad girl, someone who you would see on the bus-stop going to work in the morning.
She helps her mom run a traditional marriage bureau, and when Mihir Mishra opens a hi-tech online dating website opposite their store, a lot of situational comedy kicks in. The best part about the show is that there are different kinds of people walking in and out of the show every episode, so it caters to all age groups. Both are very positive shows that look at women very positively and realistically. There is no heightened drama."
ST: One show that popularised you, made us fall in love with you and then you just took off?
MW: (She laughs and tries to fill us in) I wasn't in exile or anything. I'll tell you what happened. After I got done with Miilee, I decided to go for a ten-day holiday. Ladakh is one place I have always wanted to visit. I had been there for a professional trip earlier, a travel show called Operation Gold, where I had gone to army cantonments and even Kashmir. Since then I wanted to revisit Ladakh, but then Miilee began and I couldn't make the time."
ST: While you thought Mona was twiddling her thumbs, she was huddled up in the mountainous Himalayan terrain. She decided to return after two whole months and then she flew off to Singapore!
MW: My brother's family and my four year old nephew live there and I had not been able to spend any time with them. I was there for two months and even there I started a lot of things. I went for African drumming classes. You won't believe the kind of things I was up to. I completely explored and jo mann mein aaya, woh kiya.
ST: Mona also volunteered as a backstage helper for a group that did plays for children. About now, she decided it was time to come back to her roots and start working again.
MW: I wanted to lose a lot of weight. I got at it, went to the gym and lost 12 kgs. Now I have put on 4 kilos again because people told me that you have lost 'so much' of weight; you're looking anorexic! Mota bhi nahin chalega, patla bhi nahin chalega. How do you find the right balance?
ST: Mona even took up ballet lessons for a while, a promise well kept to a choreographer friend during her busy Miilee days. There on, the search began and she embarked on the process of meeting people from even the film division for work prospects.
MW: I was looking for a weekly then, but the trend of dailies had become too headstrong and channels had no slots for a weekly. I did a few episodics like Sssh Koi Hai and enjoyed that. Soaps occupy you completely and the possibility of doing something fresh and new dies down. I needed something that would give me some personal time too. This is the ideal situation that has come my way, as even with two weeklies, it still leaves me with enough time to accommodate something nice. I am just waiting. Let's wait and see what happens next.
ST: Tracing back to two years ago, she had made a brave attack on the Balaji House saying "I don't find any scripts interesting enough. I didn't want to be liked by that (a very regular and mediocre) kind of audience that watches Balaji serials."
MW: I got so screwed because of that! It isn't right to talk about a production house that you have never worked with. I had no connection directly with them. I had been talking about the kind of shows on air and those happened to be Balaji shows. It was the general trend going on TV, not a particular production house that I commented upon. Later, I clarified with Ekta and it was okay. That didn't really bring me down in any way.
ST: Soon after, Mona claimed of her mega plans to leave television for good, is that not right?
MW: Movies are still a definite direction for me. I have been meeting people since the last three months but the characters being offered are not clicking well. I either don't connect with the story or it is a character that I am not completely happy playing. I'm taking it easy as I feel I have a long time to go, and I keep working on things that continue to hold my interest. As an actor you need to constantly brush your skills or you stop growing.
ST: What do you think about the TV scenario today?
MW: As of now, the trend is changing completely. There was a point where everything looked similar, where all actors would dress in a similar fashion, all stories would end up going down the same path. Now there is more of an effort being put in, and fresh and feel-good approaches are being adopted. It is more about happy people and not the unreal aspects of television, which audiences cannot relate to. I think there's a bright future
ST: Vying for personal time and adventurously wanting to explore the world, we wonder who manages to steal some of Mona's time. For those who didn't know already, Mona split with her long-term boyfriend, photographer Jitu Savlani.
MW: There is no relationship except for my friends and family these days. I am not seeing anyone. I broke up with Jitu about a year and a half ago on mutual grounds. We are good friends even now, and keep in touch, as there is no bad air between us. We have spent so much time together; we were seeing each other for three years. He's been there for me since the time I stepped into Mumbai and there is no way that he can be out of my life. I am not with anyone else right now. Where is the time for love yaar?
There is no time to meet new people and get involved romantically. Then you accuse me of going off into exile and disappearing. Fortunately, all my co-actors are married so there is no scope, which in turn means that I have to meet someone outside the industry, which will take time and there is none to spare.
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