Abhishek Bachchan is very proud of his next film Ludo, and rightly so. It is fun, fearless and fabulously entertaining. “I’d say, it is what we need right now. God knows, all of us are going through the worst crisis civilization has faced. I survived the Covid. So did my family. There are many who aren’t that fortunate. We all need a reason to smile. I think Ludo will put that smile on everyone’s face,” says Abhishek.
He had great fun shooting it. “There were many moments when I was just laughing away saying the dialogues and the script sparkles with humour and warmth. I had so much fun shooting this. And Dada (director Anurag Basu) gives his actors so much room to improvise. There are no hard-and-fast rules on the sets. All of us did what we wanted. Dada just let us be. In that sense he’s a lot like Hrishikesh Mukherjee, one of my parents’ favourite directors.”
Anurag Basu is also a favourite of Abhishek’s. “I’ve been a fan of his work for a long time. There’s a childlike innocence and quirkiness in his cinema and these are also traits in his personality. Dada is like a grownup child. Ludo was like going to a party. I remember he had directed Life In The Metro, another segmented film like Ludo. It is one of my favourite films. We both wanted to work with one another. But somehow things didn’t work out on other occasions. Finally we did come together.”
Abhishek gives a lot of the credit for his performance in Ludo to his little co-star Inaayat Verma who is all of 6. Exults Abhishek, “She’s the most spontaneous co-star I’ve ever worked with. We were all apprehensive about her comfort-level, being so young and all. But she came on the sets like a professional. She would tell Dada about the eight ways she could do a scene and then do it in the ninth way in the final take. She lit up the set with her presence.”
Today Abhishek finds himself busier than ever before. “I’ve four projects ahead and I will be shooting all through 2021. I guess I’m fortunate. Every actor has gone through the situation of his work drying up. I am no exception. That I’ve so much work on hand right now and that too work which excites me is just so providential. I’m thankful for this phase in my career. I’m enjoying it thoroughly.”
As for Ludo releasing in the digital platform Abhishek assumes a philosophical attitude. “It is the need of the hour. So why not accept it? I am the biggest fan of movie-viewing in a theatre. The darkness, the popcorn, the big screen …nothing can replace that experience. It will come back soon. Until it does I am just happy that Ludo will get many million viewers across the world.”
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