Tahira Kashyap Was Asked to Cast ‘Young Male A-Lister’ for Sharmajee Ki Beti: 'To Get Budgets...' | Exclusive

After directing shorts like Pinni (Zindagi inShort), Toffee and Quarantine Crush (Feels Like Ishq), Tahira Kashyap Khurrana is all set for the release of her first feature, Sharmajee Ki Beti starring Sakshi Tanwar, Divya Dutta and Saiyami Kher. The story was conceived years ago and the announcement of the slice-of-life film, which is about women’s empowerment, was made back in 2021. The team wrapped up the shoot in 2022. The film premiered at MAMI Film Festival last year.

In an exclusive chat with News18 Showsha, Tahira reveals that she’s elated that her film is finally seeing the light of the day. “I’m very happy. It feels like a child has found a home. In fact, it has found a palace now. It’s a wonderful feeling. It took time but it was worth it,” she says.

But what took so long? “I also want to know. Itna kya tha yaar (laughs)! It was not offending or offensive at all. I just feel like you’ve to be at it, at the kind of vision that you have. A lot of times, the world may not be in sync with your vision and may want you to change or adhere to certain kinds of stereotypes even in terms of casting for a film to be made,” she shares.

The filmmaker-author tells us that finding producers was no cakewalk as many told her to rope in a male star to make the film bankable. “I was expected to have a male protagonist because that’s the way to get the budgets. It was one of the suggestions I got. They told me that if I want my project to be greenlit and see the light of day, I should consider writing a draft where I have a young male A-lister actor,” she recalls.

But Tahira turned a deaf ear to them and stuck her ground. “I think I took a harder route by not succumbing to these temptations and stuck to my vision and that’s also why I think this film took its time. And apart from that, there are many things that happened in my personal life. After that, the pandemic happened, which stopped a lot of things for a lot of people,” she states.

Ironically, it took the men at Applause Entertainment and Ellipsis Entertainment to finally back Sharmajee Ki Beti. “You tend to take the sole credit for a journey but that’s not the case here. A lot of people believed in my vision. I’ve been very fortunate to not just have women back it up but men too. My producers are all men and it’s amazing and lovely that they strongly felt about my film too and stuck by it,” Tahira points out.

She adds, “That’s why I want the men to watch my film too. It isn’t just the prerogative of women to be feminists. Men can be feminists too. My film isn’t made to show that women are better than men. Through it, I want to tell everyone, ‘Listen to our stories. We can be funny, comical, dark. We can be everything. Give us a chance. We might just entertain you.’”