Actor-producer Namita Lal was a banker all her life, but it was difficult to remove the acting bug that had caught her at an early age. As luck would have it, she started her full-time acting journey in 2019, and she came here to stay. Though she has been a part of many theater productions, her big screen stint is fairly new, and she says she feels fortunate to play such diverse characters.
Talking about how she made her way in the entertainment industry, she said, “I started acting in my college, St. Stephens, Delhi, many years ago. I did a big production, and after that, I thought I would get a career in theater and acting, but it didn’t happen. I became a banker, and, after many decades of being a banker, I got an opportunity to do theater again in Singapore. I did 12 theater productions in Singapore, India and the UK , everything ranging from Another Ticket to Bollywood to Lihaaf.”
“In Lihaaf, I played the role of Rabbo , a masseuse who gets into a same sex relationship with her queen. It was written by Ismat Chughtai and was being made into a film in India, and Rahat Kazmi, the director, offered me the same role. So I came here as an actor, and because I was involved with the story of Lihaaf, I contributed to it as a producer. I took the film to Cannes, and we formed a strategic alliance with Oscar-winning producer Marc Baschet. So it was all a wondrous journey of how I became an actor-producer,” she added.
Lihaaf is definitely one of the major milestones of her career, as it was during its shoot that she met different filmmakers who were making films in Kashmir, and that’s how she featured in films based in Jammu and Kashmir, like Football, Oxygen, and Country of Blind. She added, “As I relocated to Mumbai, I also started auditioning for roles. So I did the web series The Trial with Kajol, Made in Heaven, and last year I did three productions, one with Vinay Pathak, another with Jaaved Jaffrey, and a third one at Aligarh Muslim University. So far, I have done 10 feature films, and in every film, I have played a completely different character. I think I’ve been blessed to get the roles that I could not have imagined I would be playing in different films that I have done. I also did Made in Heaven streaming on Amazon Prime and film Before Life After Death is streaming on Netflix and I was nominated Best Actor by Septimius Awards in Amsterdam”
Being able to shoot for different projects in different locations has been a wonderful experience for Namita, and she said, “It’s a fun experience, and I’m looking forward to a lot more.”
She also confessed that she became a banker by accident, and her heart always knew she wanted to be seen on the screen. “I was always manifesting it, and when I got an opportunity, I jumped into it.”
