In the nine years that she has been in the Hindi film industry, Kangana Ranaut has had a dream debut, a bad lip job, two alleged affairs with married men, a mystery boyfriend, a few disastrous films, two National Awards and significant box-office success.
It has been an intense roller-coaster ride for this wild card entry who at one point seemed to have everything going against her. No experience, no pedigree, no famous last name, no wealthy dad. Yet, here she is with Tanu Weds Manu Returns, winning hearts and accolades in a double role that is being described as one of her best performances so far.
How did the woman who sports stubborn curls, speaks with a curious accent and has struggled to fit into the mainstream find such easy and generous acceptance once she broke the mould? Is it because Ranaut is finally playing to her strengths? Is it a mere coincidence that the two films that have resuscitated her career, Queen and Tanu Weds Manu Returns, are about vulnerable women coming of age, with some old-fashioned soul searching in the backdrop of instantly recognisable middle-class homes?
If the first few years of Ranaut’s professional life were about finding her groove and settling into the character archetype of the substance abusing, unhinged and potentially dangerous urban female protagonist, this phase is all about channelling her inner small-town girl. If she was clearly out of depth in such films as Tezz, Rascals, Knock Out and No Problem where she was either a cleavage-revealing prop or a footnote, she has found her niche in Tanu Weds Manu and Queen with roles that she wears like Spandex.
Ranaut was 17 when she acted in Gangster in 2006 and was already living in with married actor Aditya Panscholi. In a series of films thereafter with the highs of Woh Lamhe, Fashion and Life in a Metro, she established herself as an actor with immense promise and undeniable screen presence, even if she was yet to break into the A-list league.
Ranaut’s fortunes fluctuated wildly in 2010. Kites was a disaster. This was the year in which she dazzled in Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai but also when her troubles began on the professional and personal fronts.
Sometime in 2012, when Revolver Rani, Krissh 3, Queen and Tanu Weds Manu Returns were under production, a sombre Ranaut confided to a journalist that she had been chastised, and how. Her alleged affair with a formidable married actor had ended with a public-relations nightmare for the actress and a full-blown cover story in the Stardust magazine detailing her humiliation. Quoting sources, the story (perhaps unintentionally) made Ranaut appear like her off-kilter and fragile movie characters. She cut a rather sorry figure, reportedly begging the man to marry her and divorce his famous and influential wife.
The backlash was significant. The audiences could not accept her blonde turn and patchy comic timing in films such as Double Dhamaal and No Problem. The industry did not risk taking sides with an actress who had allegedly nearly wrecked a star home. As Ranaut admitted in her interviews later, her work suffered, and she was forced to accept any offer that came her way. The first Tanu Weds Manu, which had been released the previous year, was the only saving grace in an otherwise dismal phase.
The ground Ranaut had covered with films such as Fashion (2008) was hers no more. She was sore about the fact that despite investing in the chicest designer threads and working hard towards building a glamourous image, she had failed to garner even a single brand endorsement. Even the media, which had been enamoured by her, had stopped calling her. In her own words, she had turned into a social pariah.
Speaking of her “second and last chance”, as she described the new phase, Ranaut confessed, she was back from her misadventures with men and movies. “With my tail between my legs,” as she joked to her friends.
It was while shooting for the new slate of films that word of Ranaut’s new resolve began to do the rounds of the film industry.
Despite the quiet desperation that drove Ranaut to take up projects she was eventually embarrassed to be associated with, she refused to be downsized by the boys’ club. In Kites (2010), her role had been shrunk to make room for Barbara Mori, and she made her displeasure evident. In Shootout at Wadala (2013), she refused to promote the film after it emerged that her role had been reduced to just another prop.
Perhaps it is this spine and talent that she displayed in her better films that ensured Ranaut managed to make some powerful allies in the industry and the media. The two Anurags helped her turn things around.
Anurag Basu, who had cast Ranaut in Gangster and Life… in A Metro (2007), introduced her to director Vikas Bahl, who was embarking on Queen. Bahl tailored Rani’s character to suit Ranaut’s personality, and she did not let him down. When Queen’s producer Anurag Kashyap saw the rough cut, he was blown away. As he sat down to edit the film himself, he let the word out.
Something else happened around the same time: a British boyfriend named Nicholas Lafferty. He was a long-distance relationship that came in handy to stall the juggernaut of controversy. Lafferty held Ranaut’s hand and posed for a few photographs before retreating to the United Kingdom. The strategy worked. In one smart move, Ranaut had disassociated herself from her male colleagues and their sense of entitlement over her and let the world know that she had moved on from the heartbreak and humiliation ‒ somewhat like Queen’s Rani.
Ranaut has said in interviews that Rani had wrung her dry of emotions, so challenging and demanding was the character. But she went for broke again in Tanu Weds Manu Returns.
The sequel could not have been better timed. In the years that Tanu and Manu get married, get close and then grow apart, Ranaut seems to have grown up too. She is seen sporting a determined jaw line, has seemingly got rid of the lip plumpers, reintroduced the "a" in her name, and hosted a few parties with Bollywood power-listers in attendance.
As for the accent, this time it is more Edison, New Jersey, than Southall, London. But as long as she continues to defy convention and tug at our heartstrings, nobody seems to mind.
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It has been an intense roller-coaster ride for this wild card entry who at one point seemed to have everything going against her. No experience, no pedigree, no famous last name, no wealthy dad. Yet, here she is with Tanu Weds Manu Returns, winning hearts and accolades in a double role that is being described as one of her best performances so far.
How did the woman who sports stubborn curls, speaks with a curious accent and has struggled to fit into the mainstream find such easy and generous acceptance once she broke the mould? Is it because Ranaut is finally playing to her strengths? Is it a mere coincidence that the two films that have resuscitated her career, Queen and Tanu Weds Manu Returns, are about vulnerable women coming of age, with some old-fashioned soul searching in the backdrop of instantly recognisable middle-class homes?
If the first few years of Ranaut’s professional life were about finding her groove and settling into the character archetype of the substance abusing, unhinged and potentially dangerous urban female protagonist, this phase is all about channelling her inner small-town girl. If she was clearly out of depth in such films as Tezz, Rascals, Knock Out and No Problem where she was either a cleavage-revealing prop or a footnote, she has found her niche in Tanu Weds Manu and Queen with roles that she wears like Spandex.
Ranaut was 17 when she acted in Gangster in 2006 and was already living in with married actor Aditya Panscholi. In a series of films thereafter with the highs of Woh Lamhe, Fashion and Life in a Metro, she established herself as an actor with immense promise and undeniable screen presence, even if she was yet to break into the A-list league.
Ranaut’s fortunes fluctuated wildly in 2010. Kites was a disaster. This was the year in which she dazzled in Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai but also when her troubles began on the professional and personal fronts.
Sometime in 2012, when Revolver Rani, Krissh 3, Queen and Tanu Weds Manu Returns were under production, a sombre Ranaut confided to a journalist that she had been chastised, and how. Her alleged affair with a formidable married actor had ended with a public-relations nightmare for the actress and a full-blown cover story in the Stardust magazine detailing her humiliation. Quoting sources, the story (perhaps unintentionally) made Ranaut appear like her off-kilter and fragile movie characters. She cut a rather sorry figure, reportedly begging the man to marry her and divorce his famous and influential wife.
The backlash was significant. The audiences could not accept her blonde turn and patchy comic timing in films such as Double Dhamaal and No Problem. The industry did not risk taking sides with an actress who had allegedly nearly wrecked a star home. As Ranaut admitted in her interviews later, her work suffered, and she was forced to accept any offer that came her way. The first Tanu Weds Manu, which had been released the previous year, was the only saving grace in an otherwise dismal phase.
The ground Ranaut had covered with films such as Fashion (2008) was hers no more. She was sore about the fact that despite investing in the chicest designer threads and working hard towards building a glamourous image, she had failed to garner even a single brand endorsement. Even the media, which had been enamoured by her, had stopped calling her. In her own words, she had turned into a social pariah.
Speaking of her “second and last chance”, as she described the new phase, Ranaut confessed, she was back from her misadventures with men and movies. “With my tail between my legs,” as she joked to her friends.
It was while shooting for the new slate of films that word of Ranaut’s new resolve began to do the rounds of the film industry.
Despite the quiet desperation that drove Ranaut to take up projects she was eventually embarrassed to be associated with, she refused to be downsized by the boys’ club. In Kites (2010), her role had been shrunk to make room for Barbara Mori, and she made her displeasure evident. In Shootout at Wadala (2013), she refused to promote the film after it emerged that her role had been reduced to just another prop.
Perhaps it is this spine and talent that she displayed in her better films that ensured Ranaut managed to make some powerful allies in the industry and the media. The two Anurags helped her turn things around.
Anurag Basu, who had cast Ranaut in Gangster and Life… in A Metro (2007), introduced her to director Vikas Bahl, who was embarking on Queen. Bahl tailored Rani’s character to suit Ranaut’s personality, and she did not let him down. When Queen’s producer Anurag Kashyap saw the rough cut, he was blown away. As he sat down to edit the film himself, he let the word out.
Something else happened around the same time: a British boyfriend named Nicholas Lafferty. He was a long-distance relationship that came in handy to stall the juggernaut of controversy. Lafferty held Ranaut’s hand and posed for a few photographs before retreating to the United Kingdom. The strategy worked. In one smart move, Ranaut had disassociated herself from her male colleagues and their sense of entitlement over her and let the world know that she had moved on from the heartbreak and humiliation ‒ somewhat like Queen’s Rani.
Ranaut has said in interviews that Rani had wrung her dry of emotions, so challenging and demanding was the character. But she went for broke again in Tanu Weds Manu Returns.
The sequel could not have been better timed. In the years that Tanu and Manu get married, get close and then grow apart, Ranaut seems to have grown up too. She is seen sporting a determined jaw line, has seemingly got rid of the lip plumpers, reintroduced the "a" in her name, and hosted a few parties with Bollywood power-listers in attendance.
As for the accent, this time it is more Edison, New Jersey, than Southall, London. But as long as she continues to defy convention and tug at our heartstrings, nobody seems to mind.
