Huma Qureshi admits questioning herself for Maharani role: ‘I would lie if I said I did not think about it’

Huma Qureshi reprised her character Rani Bharti in the second season of the SonyLIV series Maharani. In the political drama, the actor plays an illiterate housewife who suddenly becomes the chief minister of Bihar after an assassination attempt on her husband Bheema Bharti (Sohum Shah). Huma received many accolades for her leading turn in the period drama. (Also read: Huma Qureshi says Bollywood actors, including herself, behave like influencers)

While Huma had already made her web series debut with Netflix’s Leila in 2019, she revealed that she did have some doubts about SonyLIV series and playing a mother of three. The actor had been offered the role during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, and shared that she was intrigued by the role when she was given a narration over Zoom.

Speaking on an actors’ roundtable on Bollywood Hungama, Huma said, “When I read it, there were a lot of concerns. One of them being the obvious that the industry has, i.e., it is the role of a female who has 2-3 kids of hers. If you do it, you might be slotting yourself. You still might have ten more years before you take up these kinds of roles. I would lie if I said I did not think about it or not questioned myself.”

She went on to add, “But then I thought it was an amazing script, and I was so glad it happened during the pandemic because you get all the time to think about your reason of living or being an actor and basically all those existential questions that we all thought about or asked ourselves. I am very grateful as it was during that time I got this script. I don’t know maybe if I got this script during non-pandemic times, I would have not taken up the project and would have got distracted. It was only because I had all this time to really think about it.”

Huma was last seen as the femme fatale in Vasan Bala’s Monica, O My Darling on Netflix. She also appeared in the Tamil film Valimai opposite actor Ajit. She also had a special appearance in the song Shikayat in Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Gangubai Kathiawadi. In her next film Tarla, she will play popular home chef Tarla Dalal in the biopic, directed by writer Piyush Gupta.