New Delhi, May 29 : Aaditi Pohankar, who shot to fame with her role of a young wrestler in Prakash Jha’s web series ‘Aashram’, is all set to show the audience her character’s evolution in the upcoming season.
One of the most-watched show ‘Aashram’ is all set to release its third season. The first two chapters of the show have been a massive hit among the audiences and are the biggest franchise on Indian OTT. In the upcoming season, of the riveting social drama as Bobby Deol a.k.a. Baba Nirala is back in a more intense and vicious avatar, who continues to bend every rule to suit himself and has become a power-hungry adversary.
Aaditi as ‘Pammi’ is a wrestler who is attracted to the seemingly democratic setup of Baba Nirala’s ashram. In an exclusive interaction with UNI, Aaditi talked about what appealed to her about ‘Pammi’, and its evolution in the new season.
“I think the truth of the character appealed to me. When I first heard the narration from Prakash sir, he told me that ‘Pammi’ gets lost in her faith and blind devotion. So if you can get lost in such a way and if you have that devotion and faith in yourself. And that I liked the most about this character,” she said.
“I knew it that this character will go ahead to many lens. Even now you are seeing ‘Baba Nirala’ is still wondering what is happening with Pammi,” says Aaditi, adding that ‘Pammi’ is exploring the other side of who she didn’t know she was.
“She is growing up in a way. She is exploring life and she is understanding that to survive you have to fight to an extent. She is a fighter. So she is going and exploring that and applying whatever techniques she has learnt in her sport to her life now,” she said.
If there were any apprehensions about the role, the ‘Lai Bhaari’ fame actress said, “not at all. I did think that how will I play a wrestler, but I knew if Prakash sir believes in me, I knew that I can achieve this. I was sure about this.”
Before ‘Aashram’, Pohankar starred in the Netflix series ‘SHE’, where she played the role of a police constable. When asked about her transition from “SHE” to “Aashram”, the 27-year-old diva said, “I was just hitting a dart in the dark, I had no idea. Because I had just finished playing Bhumika Pardeshi in ‘SHE’, and then I suddenly got this part and there was no time where I could sit and think.”
“But as I left that character behind, I imbibed this. It’s like wearing new clothes. I just went and stepped into the shoes of Pammi. A whole new world opened up where everybody from Bobby sir to Chandan sir to Prakash sir to everybody who was there and the great chemistry that everybody had on set and I slowly got out of Bhumi’s character. It was not difficult in a way but it was certainly challenging, because the accent was different, and whole demeanour. Bhumika Pardeshi is like an asexual girl, who is trying to figure her sexuality out, and here Pammi is just a new energy, a young girl who is trying to explore life. A completely pole apart character,” she said.
On what she feels about the works of Imtiaz Ali (SHE) and Prakash Jha, Aaditi said, “I love both my directors, I am not being diplomatic. Both are very different directors with their own styles. Imtiaz sir is more of one character/one thought driven kind of director. So you can see Bhumika Pardeshi— we are following Bhumi throughout—what’s happening in her mind, how she is exploring her inner being.”
“Whereas with Prakash sir, it’s magnanimity. Like it’s always magnanimous, the sets are huge, the characters are so many and in that I had to play a protagonist where I am being opposite Bobby Deol. So for me it was in a way daunting but holding and honing a show on your own shoulders like “SHE” and at the same time “Aashram” as ‘Pammi’, both have been a great exploration for me as an actor,” she said.
Aaditi says she is a 100 per cent director’s actor. “Anything my director says I will follow that. I am that hush puppy from that old Vodafone ad,” she said.
On her bond with Bobby Deol, she said, “I think I have shared a fun and friendly chemistry with Bobby sir, because he was always very open to rehearse. He was open to give me his opinion about how things work around, and he always kept saying ‘keep working hard you are getting an opportunity, you are very lucky’, and then his experiences of life. So that really helped me”.
Aaditi also talked about her life has changed after ‘Aashram’. “It has changed 360 degrees. Anywhere in India I go I get recognised as Pammi, get recognised as Bhumi for that matter. And people keep asking me how do you do so many accents. My only answer is that I love doing accents. I love to perform that I really do all the time. But I think at the same time playing these characters have made me grow as Aaditi also, because there is so much courage— ‘praan, pratishtha’ is so much present in these characters, that I have become a part of it. I am flowing with it as of now,” she said.
On how is OTT treating her, Aaditi said, “I really look at the scripts rather than a platform-if it’s a cinema, OTT or anything else. I have never done television. I have done theatre, Netflix, MX Player. So these are the spaces which offered me the scripts that I could explore my characters myself. That is how I look at it, rather than OTT and cinema are two different platforms. I don’t think about the medium, whether it’s going to have a theatrical release or not. I look at my directors.”
When asked about the aspects she keeps in mind before signing a project, Aaditi said, “firstly the director, because he is the captain of the ship, you are spending so much time with that one person. And secondly it’s the script which I always rely on, because my direction is in the script and then that direction is directed by the director outside. So these two things I am very particular about.”
Aaditi also told that her idol is Smita Patil. “I really liked her I think she was flawless, beautiful, raw, and mysterious. I want to be like that-mysterious, someone who can play a young girl and at the same time an older woman.”
On where she sees herself in five years, Aaditi said, “I see myself being grounded with gravity for sure in this industry.”
‘Aashram 3’ revolves around the meteoric rise of godmen in India and how the masses blindly follow them in the name of religion. It brings to light the hard-hitting narrative through a fictional story of megalomaniac Baba Nirala who continues to exploit women, indulge in the drug trade, and control the politics of the town.
Produced and directed by Prakash Jha, the MX Original Series stars an ensemble cast comprising Bobby Deol, Aaditi Pohankar, Chandan Roy Sanyal, Darshan Kumaar, Anupriya Goenka, Esha Gupta, Sachin Shroff, Adhyayan Suman, Tridha Choudhury, Vikram Kochhar, Anuritta K Jha, Rushad Rana, Tanmaay Ranjan, Preeti Sood, Rajeev Siddhartha and Jaya Seal Ghosh.
with Uni inputs
