00:00 I never wanted to become an actress.
00:02 I am so bad. I see myself on TV.
00:05 How can I do this?
00:06 I can't dance in front of a tree. I would never do it.
00:10 People who read your articles,
00:13 they don't hate me.
00:16 They hate your image.
00:18 I want them to understand that I am as bad as you are.
00:22 And as good as you are.
00:25 I can make two more films here or ten more films.
00:29 These films will always be there.
00:31 They are not time-bound.
00:32 When we ask for something,
00:37 which we have been asking for 15 years,
00:40 that one day we will become something in life,
00:42 that one day someone will ask for our autograph,
00:45 someone will take our pictures,
00:47 at that time we didn't know that everything comes with a price.
00:51 We only knew that this could happen.
00:54 Then, when we got all that,
00:57 we got to know the price.
00:59 And then you have to value it.
01:02 Is what you got more than what you paid for it?
01:07 What I got is more than what I paid for it.
01:10 When people write about me,
01:13 there are two things.
01:15 First, I like it.
01:17 I wanted this. It's bad or good, whatever it is.
01:21 Second, when people write about me,
01:26 which we call an image,
01:27 there is an image of Sushmita Sen,
01:29 there is an image of XYZ.
01:32 So, the people who read your articles,
01:35 they don't hate me.
01:38 They hate the image you have made.
01:40 So, I don't take it seriously.
01:43 An image changes every day.
01:45 Someone writes a good article,
01:47 it becomes good.
01:49 Someone writes bad, it becomes bad.
01:51 But that person is not changing.
01:53 That image is changing.
01:54 And I took a lot of time to understand that.
01:56 But today I understood that.
01:59 I don't feel bad at all.
02:00 The day you stop writing about me,
02:02 I will start feeling bad.
02:04 What do you want to achieve?
02:05 Eventually, I want to achieve something
02:09 that is not bounded by time.
02:11 Everything I have done in my life, I'll tell you.
02:14 Like Miss India, it was for one year.
02:17 Miss Universe, it was for one year.
02:19 That year is mine.
02:20 It's 1994, but it was for one year.
02:23 I want to do something that is always mine.
02:26 Something that is not time-bound.
02:29 That's one of the reasons why I love cinema.
02:31 It's because I can make two more films here,
02:34 or ten more films.
02:35 These films will always be there.
02:38 They are not time-bound.
02:39 Be it a flop, a hit, whatever it is,
02:42 it's history, it's always there.
02:44 That's one of the reasons why I love cinema so much.
02:46 Did you come to films just for this
02:48 or you wanted to do it from the beginning?
02:51 I never wanted to become an actress.
02:53 I'm so bad, I'll tell you the truth.
02:56 I used to watch it on TV and wonder how I could do it.
02:59 How could I do all this,
03:02 I would never do it.
03:04 I used to talk a lot.
03:06 I guess that is the reason why God said,
03:08 "Come and do it yourself."
03:10 And I realized when I joined the industry
03:12 that it takes a lot more intelligence to do that,
03:14 intelligently,
03:16 than I thought watching on TV how it looked.
03:19 But I didn't want to become an actress.
03:21 It just happened to me,
03:23 it just happened to me as I went along.
03:25 I have no complaints.
03:27 I'm really enjoying what I'm doing.
03:29 Sometimes I get bored with the roles I do.
03:31 So that upsets me.
03:33 But I know that sometimes you have to grace
03:35 so that you can choose black and white later.
03:38 So, I'm also gracing myself.
03:41 And the second thing is that...
03:43 when we were offered acting,
03:48 we asked Mahesh Bhatt,
03:50 "How do you know that we can do acting?"
03:53 You know?
03:54 So, Bhatt said, "Because your job is to be an actress
03:57 and my job is to get you to act, so I'll do it."
03:59 You know?
04:00 So, that confidence helped me later on.
04:04 -I must catch you sweating. -Yeah.
04:07 Smile.
04:12 You see?
04:14 So...
04:18 Okay.
04:19 And speak close to the camera.
04:22 Earlier, you wanted to be a journalist.
04:24 -Yeah. -You never thought you'd do it.
04:26 Yeah, see, the thing is,
04:28 why I wanted to be a journalist.
04:30 From the time I was 15 years old,
04:31 I loved writing.
04:33 I still love writing.
04:35 My English vocabulary is very limited.
04:37 That's why I write in simple English.
04:40 I think my poetry should be understood by 11-year-olds.
04:45 They should understand.
04:47 I write a lot of poetry.
04:48 So, a lot of people used to come and say,
04:50 "Why don't you write for a newspaper or a magazine?"
04:53 When people published articles, I found it very interesting
04:56 that a journalist, in any power, has so much power.
05:00 They can change a public opinion the way people think forever.
05:05 But just writing whatever they do write, you know?
05:08 And I love the sense of power.
05:10 That's what I've always wanted to have. Power.
05:13 And I said, "This is great. This is a perfect profession."
05:16 Then I became Miss India.
05:19 And I started meeting the press.
05:22 Mainline Press.
05:23 They treated me wonderfully.
05:25 Not because they wrote well about me.
05:26 It's because I published what I said.
05:29 I didn't publish anything else.
05:31 And then, slowly, I started reading more press.
05:36 And I said, "When a person works,
05:39 "it's either for work or for passion."
05:43 A lot of you write for passion.
05:46 But you don't always sell what you write for passion.
05:48 Because you need elements to sell.
05:51 And you can't put too much passion in what you write for work.
05:54 Because the editor will scold you.
05:56 And I've seen this with my own eyes.
05:59 So, I didn't want to write to sell it.
06:01 I didn't want to write to make someone happy.
06:04 I still like to write. I still write.
06:07 But I've never printed anything.
06:10 God willing, if someday I get a chance,
06:12 I want to print a small book for maybe children
06:14 with all my poetry in it.
06:15 That's that.
06:17 As you said, all the journalists in the world
06:25 have written in your favour.
06:27 Not all of them.
06:28 But as soon as you became a film,
06:32 most of the journalists here
06:34 have asked you personal questions,
06:36 your thoughts, your thoughts.
06:37 How do you feel about such questions?
06:39 For the first time.
06:40 Look, as they say in English, I'm a free soul.
06:45 I was like this, I am like this.
06:47 And I hope I never change.
06:50 I've never thought that it's necessary
06:54 that a person, because he's a celebrity overnight,
06:57 or he's given so much light to everyone,
06:59 that everyone is looking at him all the time,
07:01 that he should sit properly, talk properly,
07:03 and always sit properly.
07:06 Yes, it's true that we have a light on us,
07:08 but we are just as human as you are,
07:11 and as much as anyone else.
07:12 And we never hid that.
07:14 We never wanted, and we still don't,
07:16 that people think that Sushmita Sen is so great,
07:20 that she's so good,
07:23 because I want them to understand
07:26 that I'm as bad as you are,
07:28 and as good as you are.
07:30 I don't have any speciality.
07:32 I said this when I won Miss Universe,
07:35 that kids who take a role model,
07:38 that Sushmita, I want to be Miss Universe.
07:41 We want to be Miss Universe.
07:42 I want to do what you've done.
07:44 And even at that point I said,
07:46 "Don't put me on a pedestal."
07:48 I'm going to make a lot of mistakes in the future,
07:50 because I don't want you to put me on a pedestal.
07:53 Let me be with myself, that's enough.
07:55 And respect me by being close to me,
07:56 it'll feel even better.
07:58 So that's why we never used to
08:00 give sweetly, or sweetness, sugar-coated statements.
08:05 When we were angry, we expressed our anger.
08:08 When we were happy, we expressed our happiness.
08:11 And we always do.
08:12 Some people don't like us, some don't.
08:14 You can make everyone happy.
08:17 ( music playing )
08:19 [Music]
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