Actress Zoya Hussain, who plays a mute girl in Anurag Kashyap's upcoming film Mukkabaaz, says the speaking disability of her character is symbolic of the state of women in a patriarchal society.
Hussain, a newcomer, learnt sign language for the film. She says she treated her character Sunaina in a humane way rather than with sympathy.
"Though my character is mute, she is not seeking sympathy from anyone," Hussain told IANS. "She is a young, confident and self-sufficient girl who holds a strong opinion on everything. Her speaking disability is somewhere symbolic of women's voice in our society, where women are not allowed to express their opinion in a patriarchal system."
The actress added that she had a great experience learning sign language from Sangeeta Gala, who has trained artistes in films like Black (2005), Barfi! (2012) and Shamitabh (2015).
"During the whole process of learning it, I also interacted with many mute people and understood how severe the problem is. Since Sangeeta works with a lot of children who are deaf and dumb, I show how they suffer. Since their parents cannot teach them in any language and they struggle to express themselves from childhood, they harm themselves out of frustration. It is heartbreaking," she said.
Born and brought up in Delhi, Hussain worked as a theatre actress for quite some time before packing her bags for Mumbai to explore the medium of cinema.
According to her, theatre helped her to get the role in Mukkabaaz. "It is interesting that I used my body movement in a certain way to express my thoughts in the film because I am playing a mute character. In theatre, we have learnt the same — how to use our body language to express. So, I think my training in theatre helped me to act in this film," she said.
Mukkabaaz will be released on 12 January. Click here to predict the film's box office performance.