Exclusive! Rider is a journey of two years; it’s always nice to see your work on the screen: Kashmira

Kashmira is quite thrilled about her Kannada film debut this week, the Nikhil Kumaraswamy-starrer Rider. She’s got multiple reasons, but topping that list is the fact that Kashmira gets ample screen space in a hero-driven full-fledged commercial entertainer. “It’s always nice to see your work on the screen, especially if it has taken a while in the making, like in the case of Rider, owing to the pandemic. The makers of Rider called me to Bengaluru almost two years ago for a day-long audition, at the end of which I was signed up for the film. I was already a couple of films old by then, and I still had to audition, which I don’t mind, because it is always good to prove your mettle before you take up something,” she says.

In Rider, Kashmira plays a US-returnee in search of love. “Sowmya fights for love and never gives up and what I like about her is that she is portrayed as a strong girl,” she says. One of the songs from the film was shot in Leh-Ladakh, an experience that was tough for Kashmira because of the sub-zero temperatures. “But the final product is absolutely breath-taking, thanks to the beautiful camera work by Shreesha Kudavalli. The pain of those four days was totally worth it,” says Kashmira.

Although Rider is Kashmira’s Sandalwood debut, she is already a few films old with releases in Tamil, Telugu, Hindi and Marathi. Films, she says, were not on her agenda when she began modelling during her early under-graduate days, even though she’d been getting offers. “But as time progressed, my interest in acting piqued, after a stint in theatre with Neeraj Kabi sir. That was a game-changer; it was like a calling for me. I knew it was a bit of a risk because I do not come from a filmi family, but I took that leap of faith and managed to bag four films in four different languages. I didn’t want language to hinder my career and focused solely on the projects and the roles I picked. I had been taught that once you feel the character, language is secondary and that is how I began my film journey with the Tamil project Sivappu Manjal Pachai. The film, though, was delayed and I eventually ended up debuting in Telugu cinema first, but as my first signing and the project that opened doors for me in other industries, Sivappu Manjal Pachai is special,” says Kashmira.

Up next, the actress has two Tamil films in the pipeline – Anbarivu with Hip Hop Adhi that will release on Disney+Hotstar in January and an untitled rom-com with Jiiva. “There is a Telugu film too that will be announced soon,” she says. But what about Kannada? Has she got any feelers from filmmakers after the songs and trailer of Rider came out? “There have been some conversations, but nothing major, because I want Rider to release and then decide what I want to take up next here,” she says, adding, “I had a few films pre-pandemic, and then lockdown happened, so starting with Rider and Anbarivu, etc., I will have my second-batch of releases.”