Aishwarya Arjun was excited when she set off for the the Swiss schedule of Solli Vidava. She was going on work, sure, but the breathtaking mountain resorts of Switzerland seemed like the stuff of dreams. And then, reality hit hard when she stood on the snow-capped peaks to dance with the film’s hero, Chandran. Clad in a sari, with no winter gear for protection from the icy winds, Aishwarya was asked to dance barefooted. “I am a dancer, and don’t like wearing footwear when dancing, especially when wearing a saree. But I was forced to wear 3 pairs of thick socks to protect my feet,” she says.
The director, her very own father, Arjun, was shooting the song at high speed. “The camerawork meant that we had to dance at double the pace, to faster beats. The icy surface, to make matters worse, was slippery. I had to be extremely careful to maintain my balance, while dancing fast, lip synching to the lyrics, and baring the cold.” All the hot soup she was given in between the shots, came in handy, she says.
The high altitude also complicated matters, as they were exposed to harsher sunlight.
She says her skin started peeling off. “It was quite scary and painful. I had to figure out a way to keep my skin hydrated.” Luckily, she says they were near a town known for the healing powers of its hot springs. “I used the water from there to make the skin feel better. Shooting for 10 days like that was a whole new experience for me,” she adds.
The unit then headed to a gushing waterfall for the next leg of the shoot. “Again the surface was slippery. But I tried to remind myself that had I not been an actor, I would never have had the opportunity of being so close to such a huge waterfall. That kept me going.”