Arunoday exposed

The role that you play in Jism 2 is very different from those in your other recent films…
Yeah.. That’s why it’s perfect. I am trained for the action, and it was all great fun. But you don’t train for the emotional stuff; you don’t rehearse or prepare, but rather just meditate on the things about you that match that of the character in the film – you find a common ground between yourself and the character and be honest with it. For instance, if a woman has broken your heart, you don’t pretend to be this cool guy… you try and bring out what you’d really feel. That’s always a challenge.

Jism 2 saw you share screen space with Randeep Hooda for the first time. What was the equation like?
I love him. I really do. I think he’s really cool and he and I get along like a house on fire. So we were just fab! We did not have many scenes together because the track was separate but we had a great time.

So can we imagine a lot of pranks were part of the long shoot schedule…?
No. There were no pranks played on anybody, sadly. I am a huge prankster but we couldn’t try any with this one because we were shooting on a tight schedule – we worked 17-18 hours a day. Nobody had time for anything. If anybody tried, they would probably have been shot (smiles).

This is Sunny’s first film. How do you think she carried herself? Did you have any advice for her as a senior in the industry?
Sunny was lovely – she is very hard working, very sweet, very shy; she’s like a little kitten, very cute. I had a great time with her. I feel that it’s bad manners to pretend to know more about anything than somebody else. I don’t do that. When I am in a scene with somebody, I help when they ask, otherwise I don’t. It’s not my job because if I know more than Sunny, Pooja (Bhatt) knows more than me, and Mahesh Bhatt knows more than her. There is always somebody to do the explaining. I don’t think actors have any right to tell another person how to act… Yeah, thanks, I am very sorted that way.

How comfortable were you with the level of onscreen intimacy in Jism 2?
Yes, I had my own reservations, but I think Pooja handled it all remarkably and I was pleased and amazed it turned out well. The challenge was to make sure that the lovemaking scenes felt emotionally involved rather than just being sleazy. You can do that anytime. But for there to be a purpose in the lovemaking, there has to be an underlying emotional journey. We knew that making the boldest film of the year is not about showing t*ts and a**, any bloody film can do that. To show the boldest film of the year was to be honest about adult relationships and sex – we’re not going to dance around a tree and pretend that the couple is making love, we’re actually going to show them (the couple) making love and show you what that does to people.

Is it true that you and Randeep were tested before Sunny agreed to do the intimate scenes?
We weren’t tested. We were just asked if we were clean which I think is a very fair question. Any relationship that I have ever been in, any fling that I have had, these things are asked; you’re supposed to, in today’s day and age. You cannot mess around, and just because you are not going to have sex doesn’t mean that you can’t check for other things. There are a lot of very strange diseases out there and I think it’s good, healthy and clean.

Jism 2 was declared the boldest film of the year by the Bhatts. Some scenes were reportedly cut by the censor board, before it got the green light. What is your take on it?
I didn’t deal with the censor board of India. The good thing was that the things they chopped were not necessarily the meat and potatoes of the film. We’re still far sexier than any film you’ve seen, and we’re far truer to the emotion because they couldn’t get rid of that. The film is pretty much exactly the way it is supposed to be.

When you were first shown the script and you realised that a female director will be at the helm, what was your reaction?
That was the bigger plus because a man directing such a movie, with the possible exception of Sudhir (Mishra) or Anurag (Kashyap) who I know have a fine feminine sensibility, wouldn’t do justice to it. I liked the fact that Pooja was directing it. I liked that it would be a woman’s vision and a woman’s sense of aesthetics and she’ll make me look good too (wink)!

Do you wish to be the sex icon of Bollywood?
Oh! I think that’ll be very cool. Let’s see if it actually comes true.

Which actor’s career graph would yours be closest to?
I don’t want anybody’s career graph. I am not in sit to be someone else.