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Pony Verma ‘hopes’ she gets to choreograph both Vidya Balan and Kartik Aaryan in Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3
Pony Verma who choreographed original Ami Je Tomar in Bhool Bhulaiyaa hopes she gets to do it again in Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3 with both Vidya Balan and Kartik Aaryan
Choreographer Pony Verma recalled director Priyadarshan's confidence in her when he offered her Ami Je Tomar in Bhool Bhulaiyaa (2007). "Priyan ji called me and said - Pony you're going to do the song of your life," she said.
He wasn't wrong. Today, Verma calls Ami Je Tomar (Mere Dholna) one of her most iconic songs. While Vidya Balan is her "lucky mascot", she cannot stop lauding Kartik Aaryan for replicating the original track in the sequel Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 (2022) under Chinni Prakash’s choreography.
In a candid chat with us, she shared, “I was like 'bravo!' Kartik made such an effort. When have we seen a commercial actor doing a classical number? He did a wonderful job, no doubt about it.”
Now that Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3 has been announced with both the actors returning, how would Verma react if she is roped in again for an apparent face-off between Balan and Aryan in the third instalment? Verma jumped at the thought and shared "I will cross my fingers and hope that I get this opportunity with a male and a female actor."
The original Ami Je Tomar had Balan doing a classical number - a fusion of Kathak, Odissi and Bharatnatyam. The story also showed her being possessed by the character of Manjulika due to her dissociative identity disorder. Balan's two versions in the song are stark opposite. While the actor looked poised and gorgeous as the royal dancer, her "wild, unkempt" look was the one she had "most fun with", Verma revealed.
"One was a dheele rassi, other was a controlled rassi!," the 46-year-old choreographer said. "When Vidya is Manjulika, we would give her a certain walk, head movement, an incorrect sitting position, because she shouldn't walk like a delicate girl, rather look rough," she shared.
"Vidya used to have swollen feet, bruised knees. We practiced for 20 days. I would even wear Vidya's costume to check the choreography. Vidya looked so gorgeous, main uski nazar utaarti thi," Verma added.
According to Verma, since she was known for her typical "Bollywoodish songs", many doubted her for this one. "It's not like gaana kiya, paisa liya aur chale gaye. It was beyond that. I remember both I and Vidya cried when we saw it [final cut]. We told each other - we did it!" an emotional Verma shared.
Verma, who's married to actor Prakash Raj, revealed since Priyadarshan never did storyboarding, she had to prepare the entire song because "He would tell us - this is the cut point. If we were not prepped, we had to change it on set. Sometimes you say - magic happens on set. It happened here!"
She further revealed she was hell-bent about a particular Radha-Krishna pose. "I got a picture from Hare Rama Hare Krishna. That's the amount of homework we did.
Bhool Bhulaiyaa was the remake of Malayalam film Manichitrathazhu (1993) which was also made in Tamil as Chandramukhi (2005), apart from Kannada and Bengali. With ace dancer-actor like Shobhana and even Jyotika doing Balan's part in the previous movies, Verma knew comparisons were inevitable. "I knew if something goes wrong, people will say - yeh Bollywood waale sab kharab kar dete hain (laughs)," Verma reacted.
Ami Je Tomar took a month to shoot. Verma revealed she rejected every offer that came to her during this time. In her words, she gave it her "200 percent".
Now if she gets to do another version in Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3, would that be a treat for fans? We can only wait.
