Now, Aishwarya does an Angelina Jolie

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is all set to step into a double role for Mani Ratnam's next.

The gorgeous actress had made her debut with the ace director in Iruvar, way back in 1997, and since then have worked in films like Guru and Raavan.

At an event in Mumbai, Ash said she does not have to think much before saying yes to him.

"It is definitely an experience I'm looking forward to for multiple reasons," she says. "Mani is my guru and he is one of the most amazing and brilliant directors of our country. I have had the honour, privilege and joy of working with him right in the beginning of my career and several times later. It's an easy yes to work with that kind of cinematic brilliance."

But before that, she will be giving her voice to Angelina Jolie's character in Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, in the film's Hindi dubbed version.

This is the first time she will be dubbing for a character she has not played on screen.

"When you're the actor, you work with the director on sets and know where and how you want to play a character. When you do the dubbing, you decide the way you want to essay a particular scene because you had enacted it. But this time, I was going to do voice-over for a role enacted by another actor. And then we were changing the language... It was a collaborative effort on arriving at how to say those lines," she said.

The 45-year-old actor said Jolie has played the title character in a theatrical manner.

"There is a theatrical manner in which she says her lines, because of her physicality, the way she's created the character, that makes her speak in a certain way. The first day, we did it like a match, almost the way she had done it, and then we revisited some scenes to tweak it. 

"The entire exercise was very interesting and new... It's a classic story and has classic emotions, which are addressed in the drama of it. So the lines can be written that way and you can play it out in the typical way Indians emote and yet, you have to find the balance between the way you say lines and the way Maleficent would. It was creatively enriching," she added.

Maleficent: Mistress of Evil will release on October 18.

Photographs: Sahil Salvi