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More than an item!
Koena Mitra trips on Road
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Bharati Dubey
Koena Mitra does not want to be labelled an item girl.
This Gladrags winner from Kolkata claims that her item number in Ram Gopal Varma's Road, directed by Rajat Mukherjee and starring Vivek Oberoi, Antara Mali and Manoj Bajpai, will be her first and last item.
"No more item numbers for me. I did this one only because it is an RGV film," she states. The camera is no stranger to Koena who has appeared in a lot of music videos and commercials.
She has also getting offers, though she confesses nothing exciting has come her way. In fact, she even walked out on a director who she feels does not have basic etiquette. "I was called for a screen test at this director's office. He gave me Kajol's dialogues from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, and asked me to enact the scene.
"I asked him whether we could go into the next room," remembers Koena. "He said, 'No, do it right here, else you're wasting my time'. I really thought I was wasting my time!"
She says quite candidly, "I am not in a hurry, I don't want to become a star overnight. I am prepared to work hard and will wait for the best."
But what about the project that has put her in the limelight? "[Photographer] Rakesh Shrestha had liked my music videos. He suddenly called me once and asked me whether I was interested in doing a song for RGV. And he called me over to his studio and introduced me to RGV. He wanted a dusky girl with curly hair --- I fit the profile. So he called me to his office the next day asking me to take my tapes. He said my expressions were good and that he would let me know about the film. He also asked me who my favourite designer was.
"Three days later," she continues, "I was called to hear the song. He told me, 'I want you to sing exactly like Sunidhi Chauhan. You know she is a great performer'. I knew it would not be easy.
"I took the CD home and kept rehearsing it. One day before the shooting he called me and said he had signed Ganesh Acharya to choreograph the song and I had to rehearse with him."
She goes on to describe her first day on the sets: "I was quite confident. Though Ramu did not talk much. If he wasn't happy with a shot, he'd ask for one more take. By the end of the day I was waiting for him to react or say something. He just said, 'You look very confident', and that made my day!"
For now, Koena will not sign another movie "until Road releases. But the offers that have come to me are not good enough."
There was talk of Rajat Rawail offering her a role in his Saazish. She agrees, saying, "Although the story is good I don't think it is the right film for me. I can't be filmi. I want to do films where the heroines get to perform."