Though a product of the Kollywood universe, Janani Iyer is popular in Malayalam movies as well. The 7th Day actress, who has two upcoming projects in Malayalam, both paired opposite Asif Ali, talks about her journey till now.
She shares a special bonding with Asif Ali, with whom she has worked for Mosayile Kuthirameenukal. Describing a frightening experience during the shoot of their first movie together, she says, “The shooting was in an island and we used to travel back and forth by ship. One day, on our way back, the ship had some problem. Apart from me, Asif, Swathi Reddy, Sunny Wayne and the director were onboard. No one said anything, but from the faces of the ship’s crew, it was evident that something was wrong. We naturally concluded that we were going to die.” Janani laughs.
Thinking of it to be our last day, we decided to spend our final moments celebrating. So we merrily started dancing to ‘lungi dance’ and having fun. There was a lot of tension in the air due to high tide, but we reached the shore unscathed. The incident helped all of us bond quite well. In fact, Swathi and I became very good friends,” says Janani.
The shooting of Driver on Duty, directed by debutant Manoj Palodan, is wrapped up and the Asif Ali-starrer will hit screens soon. “Driver on Duty was shot in Thodupuzha, a place I wanted to visit after watching Drishyam. Mine is not an out-of the box role, but Asif plays a very interesting character, the only male cop in an all-woman police station. He is in charge of the security of my character who hails from a very influential background,” says Janani.
The actress is just back from a short trip to Singapore, one of her favourite places. She is gearing up for the shoot of her next film Happy Birthday, directed by debutant Gautham Mohan. “It is inspired from the Hollywood film Groundhog Day. It’s a very interesting script where characters are stuck in a time loop and act the same day out multiple times in different ways. I play a rich, sophisticated and reserved girl and have the same costume throughout the movie. It will certainly be a first-of-its kind film in India. The crew, be it the cinematographer or the stylist, they all have worked in Hollywood and it will be interesting to see how it influences the movie.”
Happy Birthday will see Janani in a different getup. “Yes, I have a very different appearance in the film because the director said he doesn’t want to see the same Janani in this movie. So we are working on that,” she said.
On her future plans, she says she has a lot of dreams. “I have a couple of films lined up this year in both Tamil and Malayalam, but I’m taking it slow because I want to do a performance-oriented role now. In Tamil, my last film was a hit and I want something equally good, if not better to follow. I want to do more in Malayalam. In my first two films, I had difficulty with the language, but now I can speak the language quite well. I believe it’s not about the number of films that you do, but the quality of the characters that matters. I hope to do a challenging role. I was always fascinated by period films and I hope to play that sort of a character... something like the Jodha Akbar character.”
