Ratna Pathak talks about what attracted her to Naseeruddin Shah: ‘It's entirely a lottery, we just got lucky’

Ratna Pathak, in a new interview, spoke about her marriage to Naseeruddin Shah and how there was no ‘rona-dhona’ at their wedding.

Ratna Pathak has been married to Naseeruddin Shah for more than 40 years. Together they form a formidable team. Both are actors of repute and have two sons together - Imaad and Vivaan. Incidentally, both their sons are actors too.

A then-and-now picture of Ratna Pathak and Naseeruddin Shah.

In an interview to a leading daily, Ratna opened up about her relationship with Naseeruddin, how they met and shared fresh details about their marriage. 

The question as to what attracted her to Naseeruddin saw Ratna's signature humour on display. She was quoted in the interview as saying: “It's entirely a lottery; we just got lucky!”

Ratna and Naseeruddin met in 1975 when both worked in a theatre play called Sambhog Se Sanyas Tak. In no time, the two started dating and after being in a relationship for seven years, they got married in 1982.

The actor spoke in detail about their wedding and mentioned how it was perhaps few of those marriages where the bride and groom also had fun. She said: “We had a fantastic wedding. Ours was probably one of few marriages that I attended, where the bride and groom both had fun. We had a ball at our wedding! We went to the beach, swam and drank wine, and had a great time. There were no rituals and no rona dhona (crying). I remember when I left my mom's place, we all were singing bidaai songs together. Naseer and I were also singing a whole lot of bidaai songs. So, of course, I want that for my kids too, but both of them are not showing any signs of marriage!”

Ratna has often spoken about a funny incident from their courtship days when Naseeruddin and she went on a dinner date to a fancy restaurant with just ₹400 to spend. 

Speaking on AIB podcast, she had said: "These fancy restaurants once upon a time used to have two menu cards. One for the women and one for the men. The one for the woman didn’t have the prices and the one for men did. The first time we went together we had like ₹400. We went for this dinner and we just started out in life and we hardly had any money. By mistake, I got the menu card with the money and Naseer got the menu card without the money, so he was ordering left and right. With facial expressions, I was trying to warn him about the bill. And finally, when the waiter went away I told him and then we started counting our money."