'Casting actors in familiar roles works sometimes'

Casting Director Nandini Shrikent believes casting actors in familiar roles in different films works sometimes.

Mirch Masala
Ketan Mehta’s Mirch Masala boasted of a lovely ensemble made up of actors like Naseeruddin Shah, Om Puri, Mohan Gokhale, Benjamin Gilani, Smita Patil, Ratna Pathak, Deepti Naval and Supriya Pathak. Almost every actor active with the arthouse cinema wave of that era was a part of the film, and each of them was cast in appropriate roles. The film itself was dynamic, a masaledar take on social-political and economical issues.

Coming back to the casting, most of the actors were professionals, many of them having passed out from the National School of Drama (NSD) and the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII). Naseer was evil personified, while Smita was lovely as usual. The film had one of the best climax sequences, which led to a magnificent end. Mirch Masala is a great example of a director making a film with a great script, and enhancing it by casting all the right actors in the right roles.

Dev.D
In recent times, I completely love the casting of Anurag Kashyap’s Dev.D. Kalki Koechlin, especially, was unusual casting that worked beautifully for the film. It’s unlike any casting I’ve seen in a Hindi film — that of a foreign girl who spoke Hindi. It was unique and lent Chanda’s character — who goes from being a school girl to a prostitute — a certain mystique. At the other end of the spectrum was Mahie Gill, angry and energetic. She danced vigorously, and was desi to the core. But in spite of all these attributes, Mahie’s portrayal of Paro didn’t come across as a typical Hindi film heroine. She was not perfect in anyway. Then there’s Abhay Deol, who became the so-called poster boy of indie films after the release of Dev.D. I think he was brilliantly cast.

Devdas was a weak character. He wasn’t supposed to overpower the screen. He had flaws, was messed up. Abhay managed to make all that come through without once going over-the-top. When I went to see the film in a theatre, there was a group of college students mouthing dialogues from the film. It showed that they connected with the characters at some level.

This Must Be The Place
Paolo Sorrentino’s This Must Be The Place stars Sean Penn, Frances McDormand and Judd Hirsch, all of them brilliant in their roles. Sean Penn plays an ageing rockstar who dresses quite literally like the lead singer of a band, The Cure. He’s someone in the twilight of his career, but hasn’t really got out of the frame of mind of a superstar. His portrayal reminded me greatly of Ozzy Osbourne. Penn keeps the character very soft, the way he speaks, reacts et al. His character goes on a journey, grows up a bit.

McDormand delivered a very mature performance as his wife. A lot of times, filmmakers cast tried-and-tested actors in roles they may have played a 100 times before. While, this might lead to monotony, there are some roles that need an actor who may have played a similar role before; there’s a familiarity that works. This Must Be The Place is a great example of actors in familiar roles.

Also, in spite of having a clear lead actor, the film doesn’t “rest on his shoulders”, so to speak. For our film industry, obsessed with superstars, that is a great lesson. The hero is important, but a great film has a lot more than that. Each and every actor, in however small a role, matters.

— Nandini Shrikent is the casting director of films like Lakshya, Luck By Chance and Wake Up Sid. Here she talks of three films that were well-cast. Shrikent spoke to Aniruddha Guha