Rasika Dugal takes a masterclass on how to make an ‘improvised’ film like her latest film ‘Fairy Folk’ and reveals why she never gets tired of answering ‘Mirzapur 3 Kab Aaiga?’ | bollywood news
Rasika Dugal’s life has been interesting and full circle. While promoting season 1 of Mirzapur in 2018, she started shooting for her improv film ‘Fairy Folk’. During the run-up to the release of the film, which released in theaters last Friday, she was answering questions regarding the release date of Mirzapur season 3. Promotions tend to be monotonous, but Fairy Folk needed some novelty. She laughs at the duality.
“Imagine the balance between these two situations,” she says, perhaps humbly denying her worth as an artist. Her Karan Goa-directed Fairy Folk pairs her with her husband Mukul Chaddha, an experienced improvisational actor. The film tells the story of a genderless being who forces his way into the lives of a couple, “causing a whirlwind of wonder and disaster, depending on who you ask.”
In an interview with Indianexpress.com, Rasika Duggal talks about the making of the film, which took two years to edit and includes over 3,000 minutes of footage, and how she and her husband in the film relied solely on spontaneity rather than written dialogue. He talks about why it was difficult for him to act. gambling.
Edited excerpt:
What does it mean to work on an “improvised” film?
This means that every scene has a rough structure, but what’s happening within the scene is exactly what happened between the action and the cut. There was no advance planning. The conversation is fresh and interesting, with all the beautiful weirdness of life, and when you have something in mind, you abandon it, and then you come back to it. When we speak, it often becomes illogical, but sometimes movies can organize the dialogue so much that it removes some of this weirdness. But fairy folk have it.
What does an improv film script look like?
A typical screenplay contains detailed information about where the characters will appear and what they will say. Here, for every scene, he only had four lines to explain what the director wanted to achieve overall. There was no written dialogue at all. Mukul and I have worked with improvisers. Improvisation doesn’t mean that two people can do whatever they want. It is an art that must be practiced. This is a sport where each game is different from the others and you can’t plan for it, but you have to practice as a team. There are also rules that must be followed.
What are these rules?
One of the basics you’ll learn is “Yes, and?” So whatever your co-star brings to the scene, you have to embrace it. So even if it’s something you didn’t expect at all, you can’t say, “No, what are you talking about?” You have to accept it and build on it. It’s much more difficult in practice than it sounds in theory.
Mukul started improvising long before I started improvising and when he explained this to me I thought it was no big deal. Often he combines two actors who have never improvised before, and the scene is always a discussion. Because when you put two actors together and people watch it, their first instinct is to deny each other. If that happens, you’ll end up with a boring scene of two people telling each other no. There is no real conflict, only superficial denial.
Even if you don’t make improvised films, improvisation is important for actors. So I used to go to improv comedy Mumbai to practice and do workshops. Just because one actor says a line well doesn’t mean a scene will work.
Without dialogue, you can at least know exactly what your beat is, but how do you know if you hit a good shot?
Whether it’s scripted or improvised, it’s not my job to judge whether it’s a good shot or not. My job is to be there, and it’s up to the director to know if he understands that. Because the director is looking at it from the outside and in the larger context of the film.
Does it affect performance at any level?
I had a lot of fun shooting this movie because I worked with actors who know how to improvise. Otherwise, it would have been difficult. It’s like playing volleyball with a team that doesn’t know how to play the sport. All of these actors are better at improvising than me and have been improvising longer than me.
Did it help that your husband Mukul was your co-star? Does improv work well with someone you know closely?
That’s difficult to answer. Because sometimes it feels like familiarity helps relationships on screen, and sometimes it feels like the opposite. There’s already an existing dynamic in the relationship, and if you want a different dynamic between two people with the same on-screen girlfriend, you’ll have to undo something and make something new. It definitely helped here that we knew each other well and had a very practiced working rhythm. At home or improvised. But I’d like to believe that we’re both accomplished enough actors and that we could do just as well even if we weren’t married to each other.
Are there any retakes in improvisational films? I don’t have to memorize lines, so what about homework?
Absolutely not. That would kill the magic that lies in spontaneity rather than rehearsal. We improvised scenes that weren’t in the movie. For example, we improvised three of his scenes that occur before the first scene of the film so we could build a healthy history to work with. In fact, Karan gave me some information about my character, which Mukul didn’t know and he gave me information that I didn’t know. I don’t mean to fool the other actor, but in life we don’t have complete information when we meet others.
And about retakes, the second take looks nothing like the first. Karan has really fulfilled his promise of making an improvised film. Because even though a director can say he’s making an improvised film, he often has no choice but to give instructions on set. I could see Karan resisting and holding back, and many times he wanted to say, “We’ve reached this beautiful point in the scene, so let’s take him there.” there were. But he didn’t! He must give full marks. Even if we did one take of him and were asked for another, he never asked us to repeat the first take. He said, “Let’s start over,” so it took two years. The poor guy just sat there and watched us do something!
When I was shooting Fairy Folk, I was promoting Mirzapur 1! I started filming about that time ago. Imagine doing a promotion that repeats the same thing over and over again, and then shooting an improvised movie that doesn’t repeat itself.
Is there an answer that you improvise every time you are asked when Mirzapur 3 will come or have you already answered it?
I never end up with it, I’m always so happy! Despite the gap between seasons, I’m secretly very happy that our viewers follow us so faithfully and still ask us questions about the show. I’m glad this question is still being asked as the season approaches.
(Tag Translation) Rasika Dugal
