Bollywood actor Randeep Hooda is throwing his might freely behind the concepts of body acceptance and body positivity. All you women out there, take note.
“I am so thankful that the fashion trend and that look of emaciated women, [who have] never had any solid food, is changing to women who are fuller. I don’t like skinny women … Ooh, aah … ouch is what I feel when I look at skinny women and I feel like saying, ‘let’s go have a big Mac [burger]’,” said Hooda in an interview with Gulf News tabloid!.
We were at an outdoor terrace at a swanky nightclub in Dubai in May where Hooda was on call to look debonair for the photo shoot for UAE fashion label Splash along with his Jism 2 co-star, Sunny Leone. The pair are the brand ambassadors for their Indian markets, while Salman Khan remains the global face.
Hooda was a tad uncomfortable as he scratched his newly-acquired facial fuzz (“I don’t like that wax on my moustache, it’s a new one”), but his thoughts were clear.
When it comes to fashion and clothes, he’s an uncomplicated soul. The crisp white shirt and denims that he wore during this interview were proof of his fashion ethos.
“I have had many discussions where I ask my fashion designer friends, ‘why don’t you make something that you can wear everyday’. If there’s a beautiful woman, drape her in a white sheet and she will still look beautiful. Make clothes for everyday woman and everyday life is what I tell them,” said Hooda. He’s perennially perturbed when actresses turn up for film premieres wearing clothes that look great in pictures and red-carpet appearances, but are impractical to sit in a theatre in.
But the clothes that he was modelling and endorsing were distinctly high-street and gave priority to comfort along with style. The daylong photo shoot made him nostalgic because it re-united him with his colleague Leone from Jism 2, said Hooda.
“I am on set with Sunny after a long time… Jism 2 was her first movie that she had done with me. Now years later, we are meeting as a couple of chilled-out people. She’s a nice girl and I have always liked her,” said Hooda.
Their campaign will culminate in the pair walking down the runway at the Lakme Fashion Week Festive/Winter 2017, on Saturday.
“This brand caters to a large quantity of people and they are not a snooty brand… It’s a brand that has got enough oomph for people to feel aspirational in it,” said Hooda, adding that it also helped him pay bills.
The actor, who impressed us in the gritty drama Sarabjit where he played a wrongfully imprisoned man, has come up with a smart strategy. Movies are his passion, but brand endorsements help him feed his love for art.
“I don’t know if I choose movies or they choose me. Except for a couple of films, I have always acted in films that have interesting stories to tell. I don’t have the patience or will to act in films if it doesn’t tell a good story. For me, my character is secondary, it’s the story that I look at. The question that I always ask: is this story worth telling?”.
Hooda’s career, which is studded with hits and misses, is a testament to his unusual career choices.
In Sarabjit, it was Aishwarya Rai Bachchan — his feisty on-screen sister who brings him justice and liberty — who walked away with glory. In the romantic comedy Cocktail, where he played an abusive husband to one of the central characters, it was Deepika Padukone, Diana Penty and Saif Ali Khan who walked into the sunset grabbing the most headlines.
Does he feel that he has never been given his due in Bollywood?
“I enjoy the process of my work more than the recognition it gets. The experience of playing that lonely, desolate man in Sarabjit was an enriching experience…The kind of reactions that I get from people for that role is the real deal,” said Hooda. But he has a confession to make. The equestrian, who loves horses and polo, prefers sports over entertainment. After all, there’s no politics to winning or losing in any sport.
“Sports is not opinion based, the winner or the loser just needs to show outmost degree of sportsmanship…It’s never subjected to opinion. Whether you win or lose, it’s black and white,” said Hooda.
His next film is a historical period drama in which he plays a ferocious Sikh warrior (therefore the beard and moustache) who refuses to given up on his men, titled Battle of Saragarhi.
Hooda will play military commander Havlidar Ishar Singh and the film will chronicle the 1897 battle in which 21 Sikhs, stationed at an army base near Khyber Pass, are attacked by 10,000 Afghans of the Orakzai tribe.
“There was just 21 of us Sikhs and we took a decision to fight till the last man goes down and the last round ...”
Hooda’s principle to survive in Bollywood is also scarily similar to the strategy adopted by his latest warrior character.
He’s an outsider who will fight till his last breath (OK, it’s not that dramatic) to be in movies with great scripts.
“I am managing fine because I am not the kind of actor who works project after project…It’s only if you fill your life and soul with more, you can project more. It’s only when you take time off that you learn and can give more...And about making crazy amount of money through films, remember: Kissi kafan ki jeb nahi hoti, which translates into no coffin has pockets.”
It’s Sunny in here...
When this journalist stumbled upon Sunny Leone at the Splash portfolio photo shoot in Dubai recently, she was wearing the most comfortable pair of shoes: the fluffiest white bathroom slippers.
But don’t judge her, as yet.
The Babydoll actress was on a break and would soon slip into a pair of vertiginous heels, pout sexily with actor Randeep Hooda.
The pair, which is re-uniting for work after their 2012 cinematic outing Jism 2, is the face of local fashion retailer Splash for Indian markets.
“You can always dress things up with a pair of amazing shoes. It’s an instant way to be stylish. Wear a stylish dress, accessorise it and then play it up with an amazing pair of shoes,” said Leone, a former adult star.
The actress who was sporting ombre hair extensions faced stiff resistance in India and Bollywood when it came to being accepted as a serious actress. According to her, this brand endorsement is a token sign of being accepted universally.
“There was lot of resistance and there was a time when you took a step forward, but took five backwards ... It was a long struggle for acceptance and for people to get past seeing me in a certain way. But if you are persistent and you work hard, people will take you seriously. Over time they have realised that I am a professional and that am not going anywhere. I don’t plan to go anywhere,” said Leone.
