Acclaimed actress Tisca Chopra recently spoke out about facing ageism in the film industry. In a candid interview with Galatta Plus, Chopra revealed a disheartening experience where she was replaced by “someone younger” just days before a film shoot.
The Taare Zameen Par actress recalled, “There was this particular director in 2016 who strung me along for quite some time; we started doing prep, talking to each other on costumes and lines and things like that… Four days before the shoot he said they were going with someone younger. Then he tried to fob it off by saying it’s the call of the producers. But I could see that it was just… I didn’t want to hear that anymore.”
Tisca Chopra says, “It’s very sad situation we are living in today”
In addition, the actress lamented about focus on youth rather than having experience in the industry. She explained further, “By then I also knew that there were things happening up here (points at her head) which I had dismissed for long. I’ve been so lucky working with amazing directors and learning from them just by watching their process and then sort of imbibing that.” She added, “My insides rebelled against that if you will have a market which only believes two things are attractive – youth and beauty. If they are interested only in the young and beautiful, it’s a very sad world we’re living in.”
Tisca Chopra turns frustration into creation
However, this also sparked off something creative within Chopra herself as well. She took charge of her own narrative through filmmaking. She said, “I used to do this play called Chutney at Prithvi Theatre Mumbai based on Bhisham Sahni… It too had morphed into something else by that time in my head.So,I narrated it to few people who were very close to me and we came up with the story and wrote it.The main character wasn’t pretty and young like usual. She didn’t have a male heir or any child, she is not well spoken either… yet she controls the narrative in that story.”
Talking about professional front, Murder Mubarak is Tisca’s last Netflix original film directed by Homi Adajania.
