Veteran actor Neena Gupta is receiving rave reviews for the Amazon Prime series Panchayat 2. In a recent interview, Neena recalled the time when she would get ousted from projects. The actress said that she would feel jealous of Shabana Azmi because unlike her, the latter used to get meatier parts in serials and films.
Neena made her acting debut in 1982 with Saath Saath. The film starred actors Farooque Shaikh and Deepti Naval in the lead roles. She later went on to do films such as Mandi (1983), Rihaee (1988), Drishti (1990) and Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda (1992).
“Long time back, I used to be jealous of Shabana Azmi because she used to get all the nice parts. There were many other actresses also. Sometimes I was told that we are doing this role but was thrown out from it,” Neena told Indian Express.
Panchayat, the eight-episode series, first premiered in April 2020 and became an instant hit on Prime Video. In the show, Neena plays the role of Manju Devi. Directed by Deepak Kumar Mishra and written by Chandan Kumar, the comedy-drama series revolves around Abhishek Tripathi (Jitendra Kumar), an engineering graduate who for lack of a better job option, joins as secretary of a panchayat office in a remote village named Phulera in Uttar Pradesh.
Meanwhile, Neena Gupta recently revealed that she is in talks with people who are interested in adapting her autobiography Sach Kahun Toh into a film. The memoir is an “honest tell-all tale” about her life, chronicling her professional highs and personal lows, according to the actress. The book touches upon several milestones of Gupta’s life, from her unconventional pregnancy, and single parenthood to a successful comeback in Bollywood.
Last year, Kareena Kapoor Khan launched Gupta’s book during a virtual event on Instagram. At the time, Gupta had said she had been writing the autobiography for 20 years and would often wonder if people were even interested in reading about her.
