The last governor’s youngest girl is a hit in Bollywood. She tells P.Ramakrishnan of her struggles with Hindi and dancing.
FOR HER FIRST three days in India, her thoughts were mostly variations on: “What have I got myself into?” But Alice Patten quickly found her feet, which was fortunate, since her film project stretched to almost eight months.
Making her debut in a Bollywood production, Patten took a while to get used to working in India. “But then I had so much fun,” she says. “It was such an enriching experience and I had such a great time, it was all worth it.”
Rang de Basanti (Paint it Yellow) proved rewarding. The movie set box office records in India and elsewhere when it opened late last month: the soundtrack, composed by A.R.Rahman, is still topping Indian charts. And the movie has garnered praise for its director Rakesh Omprakash Mehra and stars, including Aamir Khan, Siddharth, Soha Ali Khan and Patten. The DVD will be released in Hong Kong this week.
The youngest of the last Hong Kong governor Chris Patten’s three daughters, the 26-year-old had set her sights on become an actress when she was at Island School. She has made a promising start. Her debut, two years ago, in a play at the Royal National Theatre has been followed by a variety of television and stage roles.
Bollywood, however, was never on the radar, until her agent sent her a script from Mumbai, translated from the Hindi original. The project would give her the chance to work with Khan, a Bollywood idol. But the deciding factor for her was signing on to Rang de Basanti was the script.
“In fact, the key factor,” says Patten. “The story was great. I think it’s an important story to be told, rather political and the character I was offered was strong, so it was just nice to be a part of something like that. The madness of going to India was exciting and terrifying. Who wouldn’t want to do it?”
A film within a film, Rang de Basanti weves issues of the nation struggling for independence with those of contemporary India. A British director (Patten) decides to make a docu-drama based on the memoirs of her grandfather, a former police officer in colonial India caught in a clash with some freedom fighters he admires.
She goes to Delhi and hires five graduates led by DJ (Khan) to play the revolutionaries. Materialistic and self-centred, the friends find little to relate to in the movie about courage, sacrifice and patriotic pride. But, as the project progresses, the youths understand the spirit of the 1930s patriots and change their perspectives on life.
Patten’s most politically charged role so far, it hasn’t stirred any notions of eventually following her father into politics. “I think it’s important to be politically aware, but I’m not politically active or inclined,” she says. “The acting bug’s got me for now.”
Patten reckons she was lucky to be cast for the role. “I couldn’t believe I had it in my hand to play one of the main characters in such a layered, rich film,” she says.
The cast spent a month in rehearsals, but Patten spent an extra month learning Hindi. Although she graduated from Cambridge with a degree in modern languages, the actress says she barely picked up the rudiments of Hindi.
"I had a tutor, but it’s only my own dialogue that I know,” she says. “If anyone asked me anything in Hindi now, all I’d be able to say is ‘haan' [yes], ‘naahi’ [no] and ‘shukriya’ [thank you]!”
Her parents supported the project form the start Patten says.
“Yes, I have been the baby of the family, but when I discussed going to India, they were very encouraging, Mum and Dad have been to India often and loved it, and said I should do it for the experience.”
And unlike some visitors to India, Patten had no problems with the food. “The rule is to eat everything, drink everything and you’ll be fine,” she says.
The first day of filming – at the Golden Temple in Amritsar – gave Patten a taste of Bollywood mania. “The location was stunning, with the sight of the gold domes at dawn,” she says. “To top it all, there were hundreds of thousands of people watching, in addition to our massive crew. Many go to pray there as it is, but when they heard Aamir Khan was on location, it was just insane.”The reaction of the fans was extraordinary Patten says. “I’ve never seen that level of excitement, and everyone was all over Aamir,” she says. “In London, people pretend to not recognise actors when they see them. They fake a snobbish attitude while they’re secretly taking pictures with their camera phones. In India, it was all very honest.”
The film’s content obviates any need for the usual Bollywood song-and-dance routines.
“It’s not in the traditional format of a usual Indian movie,” Patten says. “All the songs are in the background and we don’t suddenly break into a jig.”
Even so, Rang included a dance sequence that Patten describes as “tragic”. "It was a struggle to keep up with the choreography, she says. “It was astounding how bad I was,” Patten says. “Thankfully, I only had to do that for about three days.”
There was no chance of turning out in exotic costumes since the movie had a contemporary setting. But she made up for it with purchases from around the country as the crew moved to different locations. “I did go berserk shopping. Bought lovely things from Jaipur,” she says. “Mum came along to visit during the shoot while dad was away promoting his book, and we had a great time.”
Patten is now playing Ophelia in an English Touring Theatre production of Hamlet in the West End. It’ll be a while before she considers another Hindi movie. (“There aren’t that many roles for English girls; well not good ones.”)
But the possibility of kicking butt in Hong Kong puts a gleam in the actress’ eye.
“Oh, I’d love to do a cool action flick in Hong Kong,” Patten says.
Despite being under constant media scrutiny, Patten says she has great memories of the city. “I have lost all knowledge of any Cantonese, but I remember some of the swear words,” she says. “Always handy.”
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