Lara Dutta says she has no interest playing younger than her actual age

Lara Dutta knows that playing a 40-year-old woman in Bollywood is a privilege few female actors before her could enjoy.

In a new interview with Pinkvilla, Lara was asked about how men often play characters decades younger than their actual age but she said she has no interest in doing the same.

Actual women getting represented now
“I think it’s great (women getting to play their own age). Yeah. And I hope it happens more. Why? Because for the longest time ever, we never ever, ever represented women in this country over a certain age. It was always the college-going or the 20-year-old falling in love for the first time. Any representation of women on screen was either the mother who has sacrificed everything, or the horrible saas or the suffering bahu, there was just no representation of actual women,” Lara said. She plays a politician in her new series Ranneeti: Balakot and Beyond. Before that, she played former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi in BellBottom.

She added, “So I love the fact that today there are women on screen who are in all forms, you know, powerful women, vulnerable women, diabolical women, but women who are 40, 50 60, 70, and you’re finally being seen on screen. So I have no interest in playing a character that’s any younger than I am right now.”

Recently, Shah Rukh Khan played a 30-something in Dunki and Jawan and also their older versions in the same movies. Aamir Khan essayed the journey of a young boy to a middle-aged man in Laal Singh Chaddha.

What’s next for Lara
Released on April 25 on JioCinema, Ranneeti: Balakot & Beyond is produced by Sunjoy Waddhwa and Comall Sunjay W from Sphereorigins Multivision Private Limited. The series boasts of a talented ensemble cast, including Jimmy Shergill, Ashutosh Rana and Ashish Vidyarthi.

Apart from her role in Ranneeti: Balakot & Beyond, Lara Dutta has an exciting lineup of projects in the pipeline, including Welcome To The Jungle, Suryast, and Ramayana.