Neha Dhupia not happy being tagged as 'sex symbol'
Actress Neha Dhupia who was pigeon-holed for her bold roles at the beginning of her career due to her controversial movie 'Julie', is happy that she is breaking away from the 'sex symbol' image gradually.
Neha started receiving many Bollywood offers after winning the Miss India title. However she decided to opt for movies down South before making her Bollywood debut with Harry Baweja's 'Qayamat: City Under Threat'. The movie did averagely well at the box office.
She rose to popularity with her bold role of a sex worker in 'Julie' (2004). In 2005, 'Sheesha' saw Neha portraying a double role with Sonu Sood playing the love interest for one of the sisters, while the other one simply lusts after him.
In this movie, Neha had a number of intimate love making scenes with Sonu. She created a lot of buzz with her bold approach and thereafter, was tagged as a sex symbol.
"I am going to admit that I have had a very strong image in the past which I have been trying to break out... or come out of and that is only because of my choice of films. I remember there was a point when everyone used to say that I have been known as a sex symbol, I am happy people don't ask me about sex symbol image anymore," Neha told PTI in an interview.
However, after being a part of the industry for almost eight years now, she has done performance-oriented roles in films like 'Mithya', 'Dasvidaniya', 'Phas Gaye Re Obama' and 'Dear Friend Hitler' among others. "As an actor, to be able to get into an image and then get out of it and then get into another image and constantly keep doing different things might seem easy but it is not. Every time I had to change myself I had to take three steps back to two steps forward," Neha said.
She would be seen next in Saurabh Shukla's 'Pappu Can't Dance Saala', a romantic-comedy opposite Vinay Pathak. The film releases on December 16. "Pappu Can't Dance Saala is not about a Pappu who can't dance. There is some kind of a pappu in all of us which we either hide or show it. We all have a 'pappugiri' in us, we try to hide it by wearing good clothes and being nice. It is a very beautifully told story of how nobody is wrong and if you are not cool or successful it is ok. The point is everybody has the right to do things they want to do," she said.
About her comic timing, she says, "You keep getting better at it with people like Vinay, Rajat, Sourav... they know the craft and make you better. You get certain amount of help from them. They will give you chance to keep doing it better."
Neha has a couple of more projects in her kitty including 'Maximum' with Sonu Sood and 'Raftaar' opposite Emraan Hashmi.
