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Taskaree actor Zoya Afroz on being judged for a pageantry background: You're either a beauty queen or an actor
Taskaree: The Smuggler's Web actor Zoya Afroz talks about being judged because of her pageantry background and transition from child actor to leading lady
Emraan Hashmi led web series Taskaree: The Smuggler’s Web has been trending not just in India but globally, and actor Zoya Afroz who played an air hostess named Priya in the series calls it a “pleasant surprise”. She adds, “This feeling is not sinking in, because it's such a big feat and this is the first Indian show to do so. I can't digest this feeling, it's overwhelming.”
Zoya Afroz notes that the show brought in praise for her performance, rather than just her looks, and it has been a surprising change for her. “It’s with almost all women that when you compliment them, it’s always on their looks. But women are talented, intelligent and they have a great skill set. We should compliment women on those. I would love to be recognized for my talent, for my skill set more than anything and that has finally happened. For a woman to be complimented on their talent more than their looks, that's the biggest achievement,” she says.
Coming from a beauty pageant background having represented India internationally at Miss International pageant, Zoya admits to the challenges that pageant winners face in Bollywood. “I've been an actor all my life and I started very young at the age of three. There has never been a time in my head where I wasn’t acting. It’s in between that my dream to represent my country on an international stage happened. But people want to put you in a box, especially women. You're either a beauty queen or an actor, but why can't we be both? I can be an actor who can perform and I can also be a beauty queen, who represents the country, and I can do a lot more things in the future as well. We can have it all, we don’t want to be reduced to just one thing,” she says.
Many child actors face challenges when they are making the transition to a leading artiste, but Zoya, who worked as a child actor in films like Hum Saath Saath Hain (1999) and Kuch Naa Kaho (2004) didn’t see her that way. “Everybody’s journey is different. There are so many child actors who venture into other fields as not everybody wants the same things in life. I always wanted to be an actor. For me, it was inevitable that I would continue to be an actor. Being a child actor gave me experience of working with dhurandhars like Sooraj Barjatya sir. It's a great masterclass of acting for any child. I don’t see it as a transition because I have grown up on sets. And everything is impossible until it’s done,” she ends.
