Dia: Rajkumar Hirani was the first director who made me feel RESPECTED

Dia Mirza's role in Lage Raho Munna Bhai (2006) left us all impressed. Her innocent role of Simran in Rajkumar Hirani's directorial will remain one of the remarkable characters that the actress has played. Now, after almost 12 years, Dia will again be working with the director and in our recent interview with her spoke about the director himself.

Asked how her equation with Raju sir has changed over the years? To which she at first joked, "He is grown up a little more".

Further, Dia expressed, "Nothing has changed. I don't know how it's even possible for a person to see the kind of success that he has, see the kind of life changes that he has and remains so grounded, so normal and so rooted. I mean he is exactly the way he was when I first worked with him. There is absolutely no change at all".

"I have to say this, I have to admit that when I first worked with Raju sir he was the first director who made me feel respected and gave me the opportunity to voice my opinion. When we had workshops, when we discussed scenes and when we explored the characters, the situations, he (Rajkumar Hirani) was so open to opinion to viewpoints. Whether it was Boman Irani, Vidya Balan or Arshad Warsi or me, he listened to everyone. And for me at that time it was a very liberating experience because I hadn't worked with those kinds of filmmakers as yet", she added.

"Even now he (Rajkumar Hirani) is exactly the same. He is open to suggestions and he is very open to questions. He really engages with his actors and gives us time for preparation before he gets to the sets and that's the most important time for us", Dia Mirza concluded.

Mirza will be portraying Sanjay Dutt's wife Manyata Dutt's character in his biopic titled 'Sanju'. The film helmed by Rajkumar Hirani is slated to release on 29^th June 2018.