Irrfan’s Angrezi Medium journey, in his words

Today marks a year of the release of Angrezi Medium, the last film Irrfan did before his untimely death at the age of 53. The film was Irrfan’s comeback of sorts. The actor shot for it after taking a year off to get treatment for neuroendocrine tumour in London.

He described the pain and difficulty he felt while making the film. “Unfortunately, I was in pain sometimes even while shooting, but Homi (Adajania, the director) has an infectious energy and Dinoo (Dinesh Vijan, the producer) a rare positivity and Anil Mehta (cameraman) a rare sensitivity. The crew was warm and so, laughing away, we crossed the river,” he told us last year.

Irrfan admitted that despite having acted for three decades prior to the film, he ‘forgot’ how to act upon his return. He said, “I forgot how to act and then I wanted to forget and come clean. My personal battle has made me more sensitive in a good and a bad way. I was a man of few words, and now they’ve become fewer.”

In an interview before the film’s release, he opened up on how he tackled this problem, “I did not use any technique (of acting) which I had used earlier. I have approached acting very differently in Angrezi Medium.”

Irrfan said he found a parallel from Angrezi Medium’s story to the phase in his life when his father passed away. He recounted, “My mother was sure she wanted me not to chase my dream and stay with her. The culmination of Champak’s (his character in the film) decision is perhaps what I would have wanted my mother to do... Let the child fly!”

Irrfan said that he feared people would forget him in his absence but was pleasantly surprised by the fans checking up on him as he returned. “It is a reassurance. Their wishes are like guiding angels that keep replenishing me. I had thought out of sight might be out of mind,” he said.