Four More Shots Please actor Simone Singh: Once you play a strong character, you are offered similar characters for years

We sat down to talk with Simone Singh and understand her character Sneha Patel better.

Here are excerpts from the conversation:

Your character of Siddhi’s mother goes from a mother whose only aim in life is to get her daughter married to the only person who understands her daughter when a secret is busted. What do you have to say about the transformation?

The last moment was certainly a very powerful turnaround. Instead of a loving father who shattered the belief that he will stand by the daughter, it was the mother who supports her. The way it was written all along, no one could have thought that this will happen. Even till the time, Siddhi (Maanvi) walked inside the house, there is no idea that this might happen. So it’s in that moment that she embraces what her little girl has done and what it means in the world that they live in. She (Sneha Patel) realises that she doesn’t want her child to suffer the kind of societal trauma this would bring, so she supports her. So, instead of trying to get the daughter to fit into this mould which she has been trying to achieve through the arc of the whole 10 episodes, suddenly she feels her daughter is a vulnerable young person.

How similar or different is Simone Singh from Sneha Patel (her character in Four More Shots)?

Very different. Our lives and personalities are very different. Our outlooks are very different. Her thoughts are really different from mine.

What attracted you to the role of Siddhi’s mother in Four More Shots Please?

Rangita Pritish Nandy (producer) and Anu Menon (director) were both very persuasive. Anu, over the course of a long conversation, convinced me that this is the character that is looming large in the show even though she cannot be present all the time. She said Sneha Patel is such a factor in Siddhi’s life. Her life is so much determined by this larger than life character of her mother who is the perfection that Siddhi thinks she will never be able to achieve. So, that in itself, was quite interesting that someone has so much hold on her child and such a strong influence on her, though not entirely in a positive way. There is a great degree of negative positioning going on, but she is also not a negative character at all. She is a product of her own past trauma which she is not able to transcend. So the humanity of this character was definitely very interesting to me.

You have always represented stronger women on screen, be it Heena, Ek Hasina Thi, Haq Se or Four More Shots Please. Was that a deliberate attempt?

Not really. It is very much in an actor’s interest to play diverse characters and explore characters. An actor should never go out to play only strong characters or say only certain characters. In fact, I think these characters are strong in the sense that they survived. Heena might not have had that agency in life which Sakshi of Ek Hasina Thi had. She made things happen. But Heena lived through to tell the tale. So, all of them have different character traits. They are strong characters and have left an impression on the audience. I can only be thankful that I was offered these opportunities.

Don’t you fear being stereotyped as a high headed woman?

I don’t do a lot of work and when I do, it’s very selective. At every point, the characters I have played have been so hugely different from the last one. But I think one definitely must be careful because the danger of being stereotyped is very real. It happens all the time. You play a very memorable part, that is very strong, sure enough, for the next two years, most of the characters narrated to you will be similar. So, that’s the real danger of falling in the trap of stereotyping but that has not happened with me and that’s because I have been mindful. There’s no joy in playing the same characters over and over again.

From Heena to Ek Hasina Thi, how do you think television transformed?

This is an interesting question, but I am not really sure if I am equipped to answer it because I am not a consumer, I am not a person who watches soap operas. But, between Heena to Ek Hasina Thi, the one massive difference is that things went from being weekly to daily. I think it has really defined how people consume television and the content that is put out on television. It is hugely different from what it used to be just because it is simply not possible to write the same way for a daily as it is for a show that appears once a week.

Do you think the representation of women has changed over the years in Indian cinema and television?

Yes, it has changed. It has started in a wonderful way. There have been some marvellous picturesque movies and shows that represent women in the way they are in the world now. But unfortunately, there is a lot of stereotypical representation still going on in cinema and television. I am sure there is a tipping point to that and hopefully, that time will come soon, but we are not there yet.

You were last seen on television in 2014, so is web your priority now?

I think it’s (web) such an exciting platform for everyone related to this world, be it content creators, directors, writers, actors and producers. I don’t know if it’s a priority, but one is certainly very excited to be able to explore characters and stories with a nuanced approach because this platform allows that.

Is the digital platform a boon for actors today?

I wouldn’t say it’s a boon, but it’s an exciting opportunity for everyone involved including the actors.