All the fans of Jennifer Winget have been waiting excitedly for her comeback show ‘
Beyhadh’ coming next week on Sony TV.
But if sources are to be believed it’s a remake of 1997 film Gupt. Jennifer is actually playing the sociopath negative character essayed by Kajol from the film and is called Maya. Kushal Tandon plays Bobby Deol’s role from the film while Aneri Vajani plays the role of Manisha Koirala from Gupt.
It’s for the first time audiences will see a negative heroine in a TV show as most of the TV shows actress are actually ‘Miss goody two shoes’. So in a way ‘Beyhadh’ is going to change the role of TV shows protagonist, if it works.
It’s a known fact that most of the TV serials are inspired from Bollywood films and this time again the similarities can not be coincidental. Beyhadh is a story of love and obsession of Maya towards Kabir and the complications thereafter. As the promos of the show suggest Jennifer plays a psychotic character who is obsessed with Kushal so much so that she can go to any length for love.
Gupt directed and produced by Rajiv Rai was a thriller where Kajol played Isha Diwan who is in love with Sahil played by Bobby Deol. Isha’s obsession for Sahil leads to the murder of Sahil ‘s father and he gets framed for the murder. Isha’s obsession and bipolar personality gets intensified when she sees Sheetal (Manisha Koirala) coming close to Sahil. The thriller and suspense love story was one of the biggest box office success of 1997. Kajol for the first time in cinema history got the award for Best Villain that year. Never before had any actress bagged this trophy.
1990s was that era of Indian cinema where glorification of evil characters by heroes happened. Many film stars played villainous roles as heroes in mainstream films and that sparked off a trend. It was 1993 when Sanjay Dutt played the villain as a hero in Subhash Ghai’s ‘Khal Nayak’ which was a runaway success. Same year, it was followed by Shah Rukh Khan playing the obsessive lover of Juhi Chawla in ‘Darr’ that got evil roles the hero status. Shah Rukh followed this in films like Anjaam as well. Then in 1996 there was a spate of films like Agnisakshi, Daraar and Yaarana that had obsessive and schizophrenic characters played by Nana Patekar, Arbaaz Khan and Raj Babbar.
Though most of the films had actors playing villains, it was Gupt which changed the trend. For the first time, a heroine was actually the vamp in the film. Kajol was at that time an upcoming actress of Bollywood but Gupt’s success got her the status of an ‘A’ list actress.
Jennifer Winget’s character Maya in Beyhadh looks closely inspired from Kajol’s character in many ways. Like Isha in ‘Gupt’ , Maya of Beyhadh is a normal career minded girl like any other. But when it comes to someone challenging her love her sociopath and psychotic streaks crop up. In the moment of obsession she commits crime with no remorse and guilt.
We hope for Jennifer that the role of psycho Maya gives her career a new direction. Now it needs to be seen how audiences react to a negative lead first time on TV but as they say times changing and so is Indian Television.
