Bored of playing female characters: Ali Asgar

Agencies
February 2, 2019

Mumbai, Feb 2: Ali Asgar is synonymous for playing female characters on several comedy shows but the actor is now "bored" of them and says he is "mentally out of it." 

Though he has been doing comedy shows like "FIR" and "Jeannie Aur Juju", Ali gained prominence for featuring in a female drag as Dadi in "Comedy Nights with Kapil" and followed it up with "The Kapil Sharma Show".

Such was the success of the character, that it's shadow hasn't left the actor.

"I am now bored of playing female characters because I have nothing new to offer to it. Unless it's written well. Now drag is taken for granted. That just because a man is doing a female character, it's funny. It is not! There's no novelty," Ali told PTI.

The actor says the newness of his character, the energetic Punjabi Dadi in "Comedy Nights with Kapil", worked big time but the steam soon ran off when his female characters started to lose novelty.

"I need some character sketch. Like what is the purpose, nuances, back story of the character? You can't say 'sir you are experienced, you'll pull it off'... It doesn't work like that." 

Ali has rejected a lot of comedy offers because the characters offered to him were not only caricaturish, but also repetitive.
"If someone needed a female character in a drag, the channel or production would only approach me. My argument was: why me in a drag? But they used to say audience wants only me in a drag because I do it the best.

"Trust me, for seven months I had to sit at home because I was getting the same offer before I got 'Jeannie Aur Juju'. This was the time I was doing 'Comedy Circus', award shows, among others," he added.

Ali says the "writing on TV is so weak" that he often struggles to add nuances to his characters as there is nothing new to do.

"I'm mentally out of playing female characters, unless the material is strong. You at least give me 50 percent character sketch and then I'll bring my own 50 percent nuances to it," he adds.

Ali is often asked why he plays female characters and he says he does not want to take up a daily soap just to escape from it.

The actor is awaiting the release of his upcoming horror, "Amavas". The film, directed by Bhushan Patel, also features Nargis Fakhri and Sachiin Joshi, and will hit the theatres on February 8.

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News Network
January 18,2020

Mumbai, Jan 18: Actor Shabana Azmi was injured in an accident on Saturday afternoon on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway in Maharashtra's Raigad district, an official said.

The incident took place around 3.30 pm near Khalapur, over 60 km from Mumbai, when the car in which she was traveling rammed into a truck, said Raigad Superintendent of Police Anil Paraskar.

She was rushed to MGM hospital in Navi Mumbai and was undergoing treatment, he said.

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News Network
February 24,2020

New Delhi, Feb 24: Indian Idol 11 winner is Bhatinda's Sunny Hindustani. Sunny, who mostly sang Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's songs on the show, won the coveted trophy. The Bhatinda boy took home the Indian Idol 11 trophy along with the prize money of Rs 25 lakh, a car and a singing contract with T-Series.

Sunny's entry on the show was much-talked-about. His soul-soothing voice had mesmerised the judges on the audition day itself as he sang Afreen Afreen. He got a standing ovation and former Indian Idol 11 judge Anu Malik even said that he felt as if Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan himself was performing on the Indian Idol stage. His audition video had gone viral after Anand Mahindra shared it on social media.

On the finale night, Sunny sang a medley of songs, which included Mere Rashke Qamar and Halka Halka Suroor. Ayushmann got emotional seeing Sunny's journey on screen. He said, "Hum na actor bade self-obsessed hote hain. Humein lagta hai hamari struggle sabse achchi hai, sabse badi hai. Inke saamne toh kuch hai he nahi. Jahaan se aye hai, jitna hunar inke paas hai...mujhe lagta hai inki maa sabse ameer hain."

The first and second runner-up of the show Rohit Raut and Ankona Mukherjee got Rs 5 lakh each, while Ridham Kalyan and Adriz Ghosh who were fourth and fifth on the show, took Rs 3 lakh home. Every finalist also received Rs 1 lakh cheque from Lotus Herbals and gift hampers from the sponsors.

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News Network
April 3,2020

Washington, April 3: American actor Kristen discussed her experience being isolated with husband and their two kiddos.

According to Fox News, the 39-year-old actor discussed how she and Shepard are finding quarantine to be a little tough in a video chat to Entertainment Tonight.

Bell admitted: "We've gotten on each other's last nerve these last couple days. We're doing much better now because were laughing about it. But when we were not laughing about it for the first couple of days, that's the hard spot."

The 'Bad Mom' actor then shared her thoughts on why quarantining with loved ones can be so tough. She explained that she loves spending time with her husband and he loves spending time with her.

But what she thinks is different about this quarantine time is you have so much more time to think about the other persona and their actions and sort of replay what they said or attach a meaning to something that they did.
Bell added: "Nobody really needs time for that. That's useless."

The 'Frozen' actor also discussed having to make adjustments in regards to her kids, 7-year-old Lincoln, and 5-year-old Delta, and the schedule she tried to keep once the quarantine began.

She said that the biggest lesson she learnt, in the beginning, was that she wrote out the colour coded schedule, and noted about when will be their academic and academic time.

Kristen explained that by day five of schedule, she was making everybody miserable. About a week ago, she woke her kids up and encouraged her daughters to rip up the schedule, explaining that the kids "felt so good."

"I said the learning lesson here is that if you make a plan and it's not working, you pivot," said Bell.

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