A classy act
M L Dhawan

The performances of Vidya Balan, who was recently honoured with Padma Shri, are a rare treat

Vidya Balan’s latest release Shaadi Ke Side Effects sees her opposite Farhan Akhtar

A century of Indian cinema throws up many names and faces who have contributed to making it a glorious cinematic experience. One name that shines through is that of Vidya Balan, who has been awarded the Padma Shri for her contribution to the development of Hindi cinema.

Vidya is indeed an actress with a searing intensity. She faced several stumbling blocks towards the beginning of her acting career but still created history with stunning performances.

Her real break into big-time cinema came when she appeared in Pradeep Sarkar’s musical drama Parineeta (2005), the love story of Lalita and Shekhar (Saif Ali Khan). The success of Parineeta catapulted her to the pinnacle of glory. Her winning streak has continued ever since and today the best roles of Hindi cinema seem to gravitate towards her.

In Rajkumar Hirani’s musical comedy Lage Raho Munnabhai (2006), Vidya portrayed the role of Jhanvi, a radio jockey and love interest of Munnabhai (Sanjay Dutt). In order to enter the skin of the character, she met a large number of radio jockeys and also watched them at work.

When heroines are nothing more than mere glamorous props meant to provide titillation, Vidya is generally reluctant to play second fiddle and only settles for meaty roles.

R. Balki’s Paa was an emotional drama between a politician father (Abhishek Bachchan) and son Auro (Amitabh Bachchan). Auro is suffering from the progeria syndrome. Vidya played the role of an independent gynaecologist, who is also a single mother struggling with her son’s disease. Vidya’s performance was poignant but restrained. The film proved to be a turning point in her career and brought a new level of seriousness to her work.

The other appealing trait about Vidya is her total disinterest in the rat race. She is too modest to admit she is in a league of her own and does not need fill in roles to make a career. Like Dilip Kumar and Aamir Khan, she makes rare appearances on the screen but she makes it worth the wait.

In Raj Kumar Gupta’s No One Killed Jessica, Vidya played the role of Sabrina Lall, sister of Jessica Lall, to the hilt. The latter was a young model who was shot while trying her hand at bartending because she refused to serve drinks after the closing hours.

Vidya personified Sabrina’s anguish and determination with conviction. When one by one all witnesses turned hostile under political pressure and paved the way for the accused to go unscathed, the frustration and despair that crisscross Sabrina’s face in the court were unforgettable.

What sets Vidya apart from her contemporaries is that she is a thinking actor. A fleeting expression on her face conveys more than any expansive dialogues. In Vishal Bhardwaj’s drama Ishqiya, Vidya played the role of Krishna Verma, a sexually manipulative, abandoned woman. She makes Krishna such a fascinating character by never letting one know what is going on in her mind. She puts her head on one man’s shoulder and sleeps with yet another man. You try and figure out who she really wants. Ishqiya captured her performance at its peak.

In Milan Luthria’s The Dirty Picture, Vidya portrayed the sordid reality of Silk Smitha’s life by sinking into her character on the screen.

She focused on the tragedy behind the mask donned by actors who provide entertainment but die a lonely death. Like the famous dialogue in the film "Entertainment, Entertainment and Entertainment", Vidya was entertainment personified in The Dirty Picture. She took a risk and emerged triumphant. Her role is memorable because she flawlessly became Silk Smitha during the film and gave us a glimpse of that bygone era.

Vidya was fortunate to do Sujoy Ghosh’s Kahaani right after her award-winning performance in The Dirty Picture, else she would have been dangerously close to being slotted as a sexy siren.

The actor is back in a new avatar with her latest release Shaadi Ke Side Effects opposite Farhan Akhtar. Vidya has paved her own road to success. She has woken up the nation to films which make us proud and more importantly, make women look good, not mere pretty props.

Yet Padma Shri is not her greatest achievement. Not only has she given her peers a chance to hope for more, she has shown them a path with her success.

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