Vidya Balan, Shefali Shah Deliver Acting Masterclass in Amazon Film ‘Jalsa’
variety.comNaman Ramachandran Vidya Balan (“Kahaani”) and Shefali Shah (“Delhi Crime”), two of India’s finest actors, worked together for the first time in Suresh Triveni’s Amazon Prime Video India original “Jalsa.” The result is an acting masterclass.The film is a tense social thriller where the lives of Balan’s Maya, a top journalist and her Shah’s Rukhsana, Maya’s housekeeper, become inextricably linked together after a horrific incident.Balan’s morally upright journalist wrestles with an ethical dilemma through the film.
The actor initially turned down the film because she did not want to play someone who seemed morally ambiguous, but isn’t, and eventually the role’s challenges changed her decision.“Maya is successful and she’s in a position of power and there is a certain aloofness to her demeanor,” Balan tells Variety.
Balan worked on this aspect and how the character would react in different situations with Triveni. “It gave me a sense of the person, and then that body language became natural for me — and also the thought process — how does such a person think?
Because it’s very far removed from who I am as a person,” Balan said. “She is complex, not complicated, and she’s a ferociously and fiercely protective mother,” Shah told Variety about Ruskhsana. “And she has pride, not ego, not arrogance, but pride, and self-respect.
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