‘I smoke and drink only in dreams’

Here is good news for Nana Patekar’s fans in Karnataka.

The man who played a police officer in the Hindi film Ab Tak Chappan, is acting as a tough cop in the Kannada flick Yaksha. Nana, who is known to be a tough artiste in Bollywood, was in a jovial mood at The Club on Wednesday.

Yaksha is Nana’s first Kannada movie and the actor seemed only happy to share his pleasant moments during his stay in Bangalore. “I was very happy when a chef at a hotel recognised me and appreciated my performance in the Tamil film Bommalatam, directed by Bharathiraja. I told him that I am yet to watch that film. Within a few minutes, he handed me a CD of Bommalaatam. I watched the CD and was thrilled to see such an amazing film by veteran director Bharatiraja. He is a genius,’’ says Nana, with a smile.

The versatile artiste, who won several awards for his sterling performances in many Hindi movies, said that he loved the Telugu films, Shankarabharanamu and Sagara Sangamam. When asked whether Nana nourishes an ambition to act in similar films, he replied thus, “Why not? I am ready to act in such films if someone comes to me with an interesting script,’’ says Nana.

In Yaksha, Nana will dub the dialogues himself. “I am not familiar with Kannada language. I write my dialogues in Marathi and practice them in advance. I find no difficulty in mouthing Kannada dialogues. I will come back to Bangalore for dubbing of Yaksha shortly,’’ narrates Nana.

The actor who is known for evading media attention was only eager to chat with journalists on the sets of Yaksha.

“I follow two principles.

One is that you have to forget what you give to others. The other one is that you have to forget when someone hurts you. There are occasions where media persons ask me queries with vested interests.

I want to avoid such journalists because answering such queries serves no good purpose,’’ explains Nana.

The 60-year-old health-conscious actor follows a tough dietary regime. “I have stopped smoking and drinking.

I smoke cigarettes and drink liquor only in dreams and not in real life. The secret of my health is that I do workouts for about one or two hours daily. I think it is enough to keep a person hale and healthy,’’ says Nana.

What are Nana’s future plans? “I am already 60. I may continue acting for four or five years. As of now, I want to focus on my next directorial venture. It is a love story.

I am planning to rope in Deepika Padukone as the heroine. The script is ready and I should be going to my native village to effect the necessary changes to the script. The shooting will commence shortly. I am yet to decide its title. But I think, people themselves will decide its title,’’ signs off Nana.