Pooja Bedi Interview

POOJA BEDI

[17 Jun 2008]

MY 10-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER SAYS CELINA SHOULD SPELL HER NAME AS SILLYNA

THIS BINDAAS BEDI HAS ALWAYS LIVED LIFE ON HER OWN TERMS AND ON SEVERAL OCCASIONS, STUCK HER NECK OUT AND SPOKEN HER MIND NOTWITHSTANDING THE FACT THAT SHE HAS RUBBED MANY PEOPLE THE WRONG WAY. AFTER DAZZLING ON THE SMALL SCREEN WITH HER TALK SHOW JUST POOJA ON ZOOM, FOR A COUPLE OF YEARS AND THEN SHOWING HER DANCING PROWESS IN JHALAK DIKHLA JAA AND NACH BALIYE 2, POOJA BEDI IS SLATED TO BE A PART OF ANOTHER REALITY SHOW, FEAR FACTOR.

Pooja has always known to be an alpha lady – a theatre artist, actress, model, brand ambassador, dancer, TV hostess, columnist, art collector and charity worker. Not the one to mince words and always on a roll, she talks to Showtime about her new reality show, her recent spat with Celina Jaitley, boyfriend Hanif Hilal and much more.

ST: How life has treated you?

PB: My life is an open book. I have no secrets in my life. They repackaged my talk show and had so many re-runs on Zoom. So many channels had approached me for talk shows but most of them were under an impression that the show was still on air. In the meantime, Jhalak Dikhla Jaa happened where I met Hanif.

ST: How you adjust so many roles of a mother, girlfriend and a professional?

PB: I am a mother, girlfriend and a housewife. Professionally, I have been a theatre actor, talk show host, model and a brand ambassador. I have had many offers for soaps and I am proud of that. I have the biggest of banners coming up to me and offering roles and it feels good. It is a high to get the offers and it is a high to say no because I am in a good space today. I am glad that I work not because I have to work but because I want to work.

ST: Why are you not working in saas bahu soaps?

PB: I have a problem with them. I want to be Pooja Bedi and retain that identity now. As far as playing characters is concerned, I have been there and done that. Let me not say that with disdain because it has been very exciting. It has been an incredibly colourful journey for a girl who thought she was going to end up at Wall Street.

I think soap operas are regressive and show that good girls always keep quiet and are always victimised. My personality is way too structured, colourful and vibrant. I have done South Indian films, Bengali jatras and English plays, which have run to packed houses.

ST: Life wasn't always easy for you and you survived a broken marriage with amazing resilience and confidence. How you did it?

PB: I was terrified when my marriage broke up. I had a small monthly income coming from some investments I made. At the end of the day, what I was earning through my columns got me a mere Rs. 16,000 every month. I had a certain quality and maintenance of life and I was used to traveling around the world.

Then The Times Of India picked my columns. A friend who was with Zoom at that time called me to host a talk show. The concept of the show went beyond Page 3. I was very excited. The show grew from strength-to-strength and later, they changed its name to Just Pooja, which was really nice. It became a one-hour show and started winning awards.

ST: How was your experience of Jhalak Dikhla Jaa?

PB: It was a place where you had a cricketer, a chef and a TV talk show host, which was a good medley of people. Hanif came as a result of Jhalak… He landed into my life like a breath of fresh air. I was like, 'Oh my God! He is such a handsome instructor!' We had this closeness and chemistry. I once said that I didn't want boys but men. I had to eat my words later. Hanif became an integral part of our lives. Being a dancer became my new avatar. Though we got eliminated in the first round and that was really painful.

ST: It has been alleged time and again that the voting system in reality shows lacks credibility and channels actually aim to promote their own stars through such shows.

PB: There have been a lot of allegations but we will never know the truth. When the judges' votes are shown, the number of public votes should also be there for the world to see. Unless there is clarity in the number of public votes, I don't think they will be able to rub the stains off the allegation. The day they make it clear and transparent, the allegations will subside.

It is in the interest of the channels to make these votes transparent. My fight was with the judges. They are human at the end of the day and have a position of responsibility so they have to be carefully chosen for such shows. Every judge had his or her favourite too. That's where channels should step in and reprimand the judges for showing bias.

ST: How did you take the defeat at Jhalak Dhikhla Jaa?

PB: Hanif took it personally to train me as a fine Latin dancer. He trained me and we started performing around the world – be it Dubai, Bangkok or London. Nach Baliye was real fun as we got to experiment with Bharat Natyam and African tribal. Through Nach Baliye, I met Kavita Kaushik and Karan Grover and through Jhalak... I met Mona Singh. They are very close to me. We hang out together and they have become a part of my family. I made friends for life.

ST: How the preparation for Fear Factor is going on?

PB: I have started working out due to Fear Factor. They did a whole set of tests on us – be it the lungs, ECG or blood. The good part of it is that there won't be any voting. It's purely merit-based. Whatever prize money I am going to get from it, I will donate it to charity. It's based on pure ability and not whether people would be swayed by your personal lives. Either you can handle it or you can't. I don't know if I am going to be a part of a public voting show again unless the voting is transparent.

ST: How do you maintain such a fabulous figure?

PB: One has to be fit in this industry. You can't be a big fat potato and expect people to accept you. But it is a generous industry in some ways. Thank God those days are over when marriage meant an end of a career and if you were a divorcee and with kids then there was no chance.

ST: How the life has been with Hanif?

PB: They call us the 'on-off couple' but the fact is that we have only broken up once in two years. We had a slight rift only once, which is normal I guess. There is a lot that Hanif and me share, which is utterly wonderful. There is a difference in years of experiences so there is bound to be friction.

Both of us are pretty much strong-headed. He is very adjusting. He has the gentlest heart and the wisest mind. Hanif knows how to handle me. He would come and say sorry, knowing fully that it is my fault and later, I would feel terrible about the whole thing. I see my future with him positively. Of course, there will be ups and downs in life.

ST: Of late, Pooja has also been in the news for her spat with Celina Jaitley. Celina has accused an official from the production house, Endeamol, of harassment. Pooja took up for him and that started the war. Celina even sent her a legal notice in that regard.

PB: Speaking my mind isn't my fault; it is genetic. I read an article on Celina being harassed by this production house and then I saw more articles. In one article, she specifically pinpointed Mr. Anand. I know Mr. Anand of Endeamol personally and I was taken aback when she called the gesture of sending her a champagne bottle creepy!

In his capacity as a celebrity co-coordinator, he has been extremely courteous and respectful. It is his job to persuade and request people to come for shows and that does not amount to mental harassment. It had been sent to me and to numerous other celebrities too. It wasn't happening with a personal note saying 'I love you' from Mr. Anand.

I just felt that either it was someone who got everything wrong or maligning Mr. Anand for no apparent reason. I questioned her reaction very vocally. I questioned her being so desirable to be stalked with a bottle of champagne. I did take up cudgels on behalf of Mr. Anand. He has a family and a job and it mustn't have been easy for him to bear the brunt of such negative publicity for whatever reasons.

That irked me even more. If it were a PR exercise, to malign an individual who is merely doing his job, it is very sad. Hopefully I have done little bit to save his reputation in front of his family and friends. It is easy to pick on nobodies and very rarely people stand up for nobodies.

Celina says that she has admired me all these years. If she has actually admired me for speaking my mind, why does she question it now? Has she gone through the details of the Tibetan case? Has she spoken to Dalai Lama and found out the details. Still she wears a T-shirt saying, 'Free Tibet.' You show support when you know it is needed.

ST: How did you react to Celina's legal notice?

PB: That was utterly amusing. I got the legal notice and I cracked up laughing. I read it out to my friends and they cracked up laughing too. It was a great source of amusement for us. She went around town about the world 'delusional' when she should have just let it go.

Her legal notice has been a great source of amusement and enjoyment. My 10-year-old daughter turned around and said that she should spell her name as Sillyna. I told my daughter that since she called her silly, Celina is going to sue her too. My daughter said, 'Mama! Let her!'

ST: Do you still want to host a talk show?

PB: I truly believe I am good at it and it will affect a lot of people and bring a process of change. I am waiting for the right channel and concept to come my way. I want to do an Oprah Winfrey kind of a show. That talk show enables her to change lives and realities. She had a tough life and I am impressed by her generosity.

**BY MANISH MISHRA