When it comes to cherry-picking her work, nobody does it better than Sarwat Gilani!
But why is Gilani persnickety? Oft-used tropes, monotonous plotlines, and excessively long episodes that entertain an average Pakistani household fail to charm this acclaimed Lollywood actress who has now became conscious of diversely expanding her 18 years of television and filmography career.
The 40-year-old actress went from portraying solid female characters in Saiqa, Dil-e-Muztar, and Aahista Aahista to sending a strong and powerful message to society with Joyland and Churails on an international level.
After her much-loved onscreen presence in Jawani Phir Nahi Ani, the Mata-e-Jaan Hai Tu actress distanced herself from mundane projects in mainstream cinema and television by making her own league with web series including Churails and Qatil Haseenaon Ke Naam and films like Joyland.
Gilani has now brought in her and asked them which genre of work would they love to see her in.
Taking to Instagram — in a post and story section — the star shared a blurry image, presumably from a shoot, and asked, “What would you like to see me in dramas, web series, tvc’s of film?”
The question was met with a positive response where majority of social media users voted for web series, including actress Ghana Ali, while others wanted to watch the actress on television screens.
On user asked, “When’s your next project,” to which Gilani replied, “Let’ see nothing in the pipe line yet. I’m a very go with the flow kinda actor.”
In another question where a fan asked why she isn’t starring in drama serials, Gilani replied that advertisements are enough.
The actress, who was recently seen essaying the character of Nucchi in the Cannes-winning film Joyland, loves to portray headstrong females. Believing that women have to potential to be represented as round characters with depth instead of damsels in distress, Gilani believes that actors encourage certain behaviours through their characters.
“I feel as entertainers, we have a responsibility towards the kind of behaviours we encourage. Even when I was doing the satisavitri, girl-next-door, damsel in distress kind of roles, I would think to myself that there are unbelievable women doing unbelievable things, why aren’t we talking about them? My struggle even then was, how much of these sob stories are we going to do?” Sarwat shared in an interview.
“Art is a beautiful medium where you can talk about the nastiest of things in the purest of ways,” she further opined.
“We need to talk about values, self-respect. We need to teach. I mean, media can’t just be about entertainment. It’s a huge responsibility. You need to teach younger people, men, how to behave around women. A man is not someone who beats his wife or stalks girls. Until we don’t show what a man is supposed to be, men will continue to be how they are.”
On the work front, Gilani was recently seen in Khasara, Naulakha, Jawani Phir Nahi Ani 2, and 3 Bahadur: Rise of the Warriors.
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