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| tamannah bhatia |
Tamannaah Bhatia's affair to remember
The actor fell in love with the movies over two decades ago. She’s now a self-made star, making the right moves
Tamannaah Bhatia has no qualms admitting she was that irritating kid at a party who wanted to perform solo. “I was obsessed with performance,” she reveals, adding that she was inclined towards acting since childhood. “But it seemed like a distant dream for someone who was not from the industry or had zero connections or was a really young person,” says the actor who hails from a Sindhi business family in Mumbai.
Determined, though, to pursue her goal, she enrolled for an acting workshop at Prithvi Theatre for a year. By the end of it, she had bagged her first film, Chand Sa Roshan Chehra (2005), at the age of 15. And at a time when she was appearing for her board exams in school, Bhatia had given her nod to her debut movie in the South. “I think it is a mixture of something cosmic and also this strong desire of wanting to put myself out there,” she says, looking back at how it all began in showbiz.
Apart from Hindi films, Bhatia went on to star in a slew of commercial blockbusters in Tamil and Telugu cinema over the years. The language barrier was only one hurdle that she had to overcome. The bigger aspect, says the actor, was the need to understand the culture to essay diverse characters.
Telugu film Baahubali: The Beginning (2015), which earned over ₹600 crore worldwide, changed the trajectory of Bhatia’s career. “It is a once-in-a-lifetime movie,” she concedes. “My biggest takeaway was not just the unforgettable success of the film, but also the amount of fine-tuning that happened to me as an actor on that set. We were pushed in every way—physically, emotionally.
The experience was nourishing as an actor, and, of course, the love it got was unparalleled.”
Filmmaker Madhur Bhandarkar had not seen any of Bhatia’s previous work, but signed her for his 2022 directorial Babli Bouncer after watching Baahubali. “She got the nuances and the body language of the character very well. I would brief her on what was expected in the scene, and she took it two notches above while performing on screen. Tamannaah is a director’s actor,” he says.
In a career spanning over two decades, Bhatia has witnessed the highs and lows that come with stardom. And while taking those in her stride, she has reinvented herself along the way.
One of the ways in which she has created a distinct identity for herself is with the dance numbers in films. She has redefined the playbook of item numbers with chartbusters such as ‘Aaj Ki Raat’, ‘Ghafoor’ and ‘Kaavaalaa’.
“Tamannaah is a natural. I had to just give her a brief of the little expressions in play, and she would ace them. She made the song look classy,” says Vijay Ganguly, who choreographed ‘Aaj Ki Raat’ from Stree 2. “She is a choreographer’s dancer. Tamannaah is a complete crowd-puller.”
Ganguly lets on that they rehearsed the song for 10 days before it was shot over two-and-a-half days, with Bhatia dancing non-stop for two to three hours during each practice session. This was in sharp contrast to the songs that she did down South, where the choreographers would set the dance on set, and she had to learn the steps within minutes.
I see these songs as party numbers, says Bhatia, who is sought-after and paid a handsome sum for doing them. “I didn’t consciously intend this to be a commercial model, but if it becomes one, I don’t mind,” she says unapologetically. “You have to be the hero of your own story and support yourself.”
A go-getter and a firm believer in doing what she loves, Bhatia turned entrepreneur in January with Tamannaah Fine Jewellery. “I had a specific vision for fine jewellery. I think India can wear fine jewellery differently than what it is doing right now because it has the appetite. It’s just that the retail spaces need to offer it to them that way. I’m trying to create that system. I’m trying to create that product that I feel will add that missing piece into the equation,” she says, adding that it’s tougher being an entrepreneur than an actor.
One thing Bhatia says she has learnt in her 21-year journey is that one needs to persist with whatever they choose to do because one day it will eventually work. “I have got a lot more than I ever imagined,” she says.
Bhandarkar points out that she is not only humble but also hardworking. “She is tremendously dedicated to her work and takes it seriously. Although I would be fine with it, she would often insist on having another take for some scenes,” he says.
