He made me feel easy enough that I could just act or be – without inhibition,” recalls actor-dancer Rukmini Vijayakumar, remembering her experience of working with Nana Patekar in Bommalattam (2008), her debut film. A newcomer at the time, Vijayakumar found Patekar, an already established actor, to be encouraging. Rather than making her conscious of the gap in experience, he created an environment where she could perform freely. “He was a really lovely person to act with. A lot of my scenes that were improvised with him came out very naturally,” she shares.
One memory of Vijayakumar’s, in particular, captures Patekar’s approach to acting. In one scene in the film, Vijayakumar didn’t even realise the camera was rolling. “We were about to do a scene. We started casually interacting and talking, and then after some time, he said, ‘The shot is done’. I wasn’t even aware that the camera was rolling. And because he comes from theatre, he works like that,” she remembers.
Directed by Bharathiraja, Bommalattam brought together two artistes [Patakar and Bharathiraja] whose theatre backgrounds informed their distinct approaches to filmmaking. Hence, for Vijayakumar, having both in her first film was a valuable experience. “When you think of acting, you imagine flamboyance. That didn’t exist,” Vijayakumar says. She remembers Patekar’s performance as remarkably organic, without the exaggerated mannerisms she had associated with acting. “He was in the character, and spoke just like he was interacting with someone. He was really supportive and I learnt a lot working with him.”
Their association continued beyond the film. In the years that followed, when she performed in Mumbai, Patekar would occasionally come to watch her shows. Although they lost contact, her memories of him remain warm. “He was a great actor, and I was lucky to have worked with him in my first film,” she says.