It’s okay to play my age and that’s not an issue: Revathi on Bollywood stereotypes

[caption id=“attachment_2205438” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Revathi in a file photo[/caption] Mumbai: Actress-director Revathi has never shied away from playing characters of her age, but she feels there is a dearth of roles revolving around life of an elderly woman and emphasised on a need to break out from the mold of stereotypical presentation. “The kind of films I get is a little boring because I feel it’s okay to play my age and that’s not an issue. But it’s just that playing my age doesn’t mean just being a mother, lawyer or a doctor. There is no characterisation. A very few writers write characters that suits a 35 or 45 plus woman,” Revathi, 48, told IANS. The Love actress has carved a niche for herself in Hindi, Tamil and Malayalam industries by performing varied roles. She also shared that she is looking for a challenging role. “As an actor, I’m a little bored with the roles I’m getting. It doesn’t challenge me. I’m not interested in numbers. I want to do quality work and feel happy about it. For my age, none of the language writers have much to offer. That’s why I’m being very slow and doing just one film in two years,” said Revathi, who has directed films like Phir Milenge and Mumbai Cutting. What about penning a role to justify the mentioned age bracket? “As a filmmaker, I don’t decide on things like this. For me, it’s an incident or story that touches my heart. I decide to make a movie on it. But, having said that I have two scripts with me and one script is about a 45 plus woman,” she said. Revathi, who played a mother in the 2014 Bollywood film 2 States, has maintained a balance between commercial and parallel cinema. She terms “cinema as a medium of entertainment”. “I have been a fan of good entertainment. Cinema is a medium of entertainment. Art is like all over the world and cinema for me, is an art. Art has variety and that’s the best part of it and that is why I have been able to balance,” she said. Known for films like Raat and Ab Tak Chhappan, Revathi has directed films from a women’s point of view. She says the reason behind it is that it’s difficult to step into a man’s shoes. “I don’t decide that my film has to be from a woman’s point of view…it’s just that my last two films happened to be so. Getting into a man’s shoes and think like them is not very easy. I need to train myself for that,” she said. Meanwhile, Revathi, currently enjoying the success of Margarita with a Straw, says she had a great time sharing screen space with Kalki Koechlin in the film. “There was no difficulty because Kalki is a simple hearted girl and very committed and that’s all you need. When people are committed, you connect to your role immediately. I had a great time with her,” she said. IANS