Alaya F admits her films cater to urban audiences, says nobody will know her if she goes to smaller towns

Alaya F’s next U-Turn features the actor as a journalist trying to track down the source of several traffic accidents on a highway flyover.

However, the young woman finds herself entangled in some mysterious deaths instead, leading the police officers assigned to the case to look more closely at her involvement. Alaya recently shared that most of the projects she has worked on so far have been aimed for an urban audience. She also admitted that if she were to travel to a tier-2 city or town in India, probably no one would recognise her.

U-Turn, directed by Arif Khan, also stars Priyanshu Painyuli, Aashim Gulati, Manu Rishi Chadha and Rajesh Sharma. It is the Hindi remake of the 2016 Kannada film starring Shraddha Srinath in the lead role. Directed by Pawan Kumar, the film has been remade in several languages including Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali and Filipino. It will premiere on Zee5 on April 28.

Alaya told Mid-Day that she is aware that the kind of films she has done have mostly appealed to an urban audience. She explained, “Most of my films so far have catered to an urban audience. If I go to Mumbai, Delhi, or Bengaluru, I will be asked for a picture by a lot of people. But if I take a flight and go [to a tier-2] town, nobody will know who I am.”

The actor is the granddaughter of veteran actor Kabir Bedi. Her mother Pooja Bedi also acted in a few films including the popular Aamir Khan-starrer Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar (1992). Alaya made her debut as a young pregnant woman trying to connect with her father in the comedy Jawaani Jaaneman (2020) co-starring Saif Ali Khan and Tabu as her parents. She won the Best Female Debut trophy at the 2021 Filmfare Awards for her performance.

Last year, she was seen opposite Kartik Aaryan in the Disney+ Hotstar thriller Freddy. Alaya was last seen in Almost Pyaar with DJ Mohabbat opposite newcomer Karan Mehta. The musical love story was directed by Anurag Kashyap. She also has the films Ek Aur Ghazab Kahani and Sri, with Rajkummar Rao, lined up for release this year.