“We have disguised cheesiness in ‘Shirin Farhad…'” – Farah Khan in conversation with Koimoi

A homemaker for close to eight years, mother of three for over four years, successful choreographer for a couple of decades, an director, an emerging producer and now also a lead actress – It has been an eventful journey for Farah Khan. More so since she is currently dabbling with the promotion of her debut leading lady outing Shirin Farhad Ki Toh Nikal Padi even as her production Joker too gears up for release next week. Over to the lady who has been busier than ever before.

Was it the simplicity factor that enticed you to go ahead with ‘Shirin Farhad’?
When I read the script, I realised that this would be a very simple film; something in the zone of a Hrishikesh Mukherjee or Basu Chatterjee film. What I like most is the climax scene which is so poignant that it made me smile and cry at the same time.

One just hopes that there isn’t too much of ‘rona dhona’ though since the promos promise a feel good outing.
It is by the virtue of being a sweet love story. Moreover that little conflict in the tale is something that everyone would identify with. Like Boman has this dominant mother who doesn’t like the girl whom he loves. On the other hand there is an emotional reason behind my character being unmarried in the film. See, there are unmarried people out there who have to look after people older than them. However instead of being overtly emotional or sentimental about it, we have put it rather funnily.

Well, there seems to be quite some fun in the offering, what with this entire lingerie fixation that you and Boman seem to have in the film.
Yeah, lingerie is a character in itself in the film (laughs). It works big time in the film because poor Boman is harrowed; after all, no girl wants to marry him due to his profession.

So how have you ensured that all of it seems cute-n-naughty rather than being cheesy in the film?
That’s where the comfort between Boman and I comes into picture. In fact why just scenes featuring lingerie; even in a few romantic scenes in the film, we have played it differently. I was sure that if we would have played them normally like those quintessential hero-heroines, we would have got ‘andas’ on our face.

How did you go about that?
We were sure about approaching the scenes differently. (Smiles) We sometimes used to fight with (director) Bela (Sehgal) to try it out our own way. Come on, we are so old in the movie and obviously can’t afford to behave as teenagers. So what we have done is very cleverly disguised the cheesy quotient. This means before audience starts questioning our cheesy lines, we ourselves can be seen laughing at them!