Ileana D’Cruz: The Girl Who Turned Down Rajnikanth

It’s tough to write an interview with Ileana D’cruz – this is our fourteenth shot at it. We’ve shut the pictures, taken a walk, downed two espressos, played Johnny Cash on a loop and then finally deleted all those nonsensical drafts. Ileana has that affect on men – she’s like that really really really pretty girl next door you want to desperately speak to but don’t have the balls to, till one day you hear a bell on the door and she’s come to invite your “father and family for her wedding dinner”.

It’s a good thing then that alcohol fives times the permissible limit was flowing through our veins like Sehwag tearing through the Aussie bowling attack when we interviewed her. So we popped in about a gazillion mints, straightened the white satin kerchief that sat in all its glory in the front pocket of the suit we were wearing from last night, settled down on the floor of a carpeted corridor of a five star hotel, called Ileana and started writing down on the back of our airline ticket. Thank god it was a printout. Tragically it was only three pages, but then we remembered we could use both sides. A Bombay-Delhi flight would not be much to miss for her. Hell we’d happily miss one to South Africa, even though we love South Africa.

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Ileana D’cruz ladies and gentlemen was born in Bombay, lives in Goa, is Telugu cinema’s biggest actress, is all set to make her Bollywood debut in Anurag Basu movie ’Bardi’ and has turned down a role opposite Rajnikanth (which is blasphemy where she comes from). Phew! And if all that doesn’t impress you – turn left, right, and stop staring.

How are you feeling now (she’s been down with the flu and so have we – do you think it could be a sign)?

My voice is still bad… The temperature has suddenly dropped ,it’s 23 degrees now.

Well, at least you got to go home to Goa for Christmas… Umm no, wait 23 degrees is not cold. It’s four degrees in Delhi. 23 degrees is really not cold.

I’m not in Delhi am I?

Fair enough. So have you always been a sea person? Between Goa and Mumbai? Or are you a mountain person?

I was born in Mumbai and we lived in this really old Bungalow in Mahim (Mumbai) right on the sea. It belonged to my great grandmother. To be honest I don’t know much of the mountains. There are mountains at the back of my house in Goa though…

Nah, we meant the Himalayas. Anyway this Anurag Basu movie – you’re the only one who’s talking in it (Ranbir plays a mute and Priyanka plays a women who often lapses into incoherence in the movie).

To be honest, we’re still ‘talking’ about the movie.

Was it a serious decision to start with a serious film to make your Bollywood foray?

To be honest, I haven’t planned things. I have taken things as they come. Even modeling and movies happened just like that. I enjoy my work and this movie looks like it will be great exposure in terms of work, but I never really thought about it to be honest.

And there were no narcissistic thoughts related to it – like you would be the lead actresses or any such thing that many of your other contemporaries think of?

I’m capable and am sure I’ll make my place in Bollywood. So I don’t need to be insecure.

Hmm, so Goa eh? The land of Kings Beer (drool)… Are you all about Goan sausages and a chilled bottle of Kings?

Actually I’m not a beer sort of a person, I’m like a schoolgirl. I just do my shots (she is not talking about tequila), finish work and get to bed by 11.

Oh yeah, you are an actress and you can’t talk about drinking… We get it.

No ya. Seriously I don’t drink alcohol. I get drowsy after one Breezer. I don’t like the taste and smell of alcohol.

So when did the whole move to Goa happen?

I was in Bombay till the time I was 10 and then the whole family moved. We’ve been shuttling between Bombay and Goa since then. I’ve spent my teen years in Goa and it’s so much fun. It’s like being on a holiday all the time.

… Ah, a perma-vacationer? Thanks for making the rest of us feel bad.

Aww. But well, I can’t complain. Here you live in your shorts and just have to go to the beach over the weekend. In Mumbai you always have too much going on and are always rushing from one place to another. So how can I miss Mumbai when I live in Goa?

So then how did you end up becoming a phenomenon down South?

Telugu films just happened. I never planned it. When I went down South, I didn’t even know the language. Everyone around was talking in a completely different language. The first day of shooting, there was a clap and I had no clue what was happening. I had never even thought about modeling. I was always a baggy jeans and tee kind of girl – had been a tomboy all my life and was so clumsy I was called butter-fingers. I was the only one in the house who had a plastic plate to eat from since i was hopeless with the fork and a knife.

Now? They let you eat on a glass plate at home?

Oh yeah… Come on!.

And when did glamour happen?

I did a couple of ads when I was 17…

So that was two years ago right?

Haha no. I’m not going to be 18 for eight years (she’s 23).

You killed it.

I did, didn’t I? So anyways, when I landed in Hyderabad for my first movie, the biggest charm of the movie was that half of it would be shot in the US... And then one thing happened after another. For the first 5-6 films it was like the directors were pushing me to do work and then I realized I was beginning to get a high from it (a grandfather clock goes off in the background – our crush gets stronger).

So wait, then you never finished college?

Actually I did.

By correspondence? Haha, that doesn’t count.

Ofcourse it does. I have a degree and everything.

It doesn’t (she’s beginning to get cross, we picture her turning up a corner of a lip in an embarrassed grin and we love it). So you’re the first actress to turn down Rajnikanth? Isn’t it borderline blasphemy in the South? (She turned down the animation film Hara opposite Rajni’s animated avatar)

It is. But I have a mind of my own. I did not have my heart set on it and they would not have used my face at all. So…

Not used your face? Fools! They wanted to make you the voice of the cheetah or something?

No my expressions would have been captured and then they would have gone on with it.

Water under the bridge then… What say? So apart from your correspondence material do you read other books too?

Haha. Cheap shot. The last book I loved was The Thousand Splendid Suns and now its Eat, Pray Love.

Ick!

You’re a boy, you’re not supposed to like it.

No comic books?

Nope, I’m quite an intense person. I’m calm and composed with people but I’m a total goofball around my friends and family, but still intense.

We would ask you what you like for breakfast but we already know that…you like your eggs scrambled.

Haha. Yes. But I remember you got me anda bhurji instead. Sometimes I crave for this Goan bread – poi

… And a beer?

Will you stop about the beer already? You know it’s strange that FHM is a men’s mag and you haven’t asked me anything related to men…

What do you want us to ask you?

I don’t know… I don’t want to tell you how to do an interview. (giggles)

Are you single?

Is that for the magazine?

Haha. What do you mean is that for the magazine?

Umm, ah ahaha. Yes I’m very much single.

Then that’s all we need to know.

Are you sure?

Yep.

Haha!

2 hours later, she’s tweeting about making marzipans. And then you wonder why she is on the cover.