“You need to create a parallel personality and wear it as your own skin”: Yami Gautam Dhar on her transformational role in Amazon MGM Studios and Aanand L. Rai’s Nayyi Navelli

Welcome to the Awasthi parivaar; jahaan drama hai, masti hai aur sabse badhkar, ek daayan ka raaz hai! Amazon MGM Studios and Colour Yellow’s Nayyi Navelli takes a familiar Indian family and turns their everyday world into something wonderfully unexpected and fantastical, packed with larger-than-life personalities, family banter, twists galore and even a family dog thrown into the mix! Blending family comedy, fantasy, mystery and action, the film brings together masti, humour, emotion and plenty of surprises, creating a world that feels rooted in an Indian family while taking audiences somewhere they haven’t quite been before. With every new reveal opening up another layer of this eccentric household, Nayyi Navelli promises the kind of larger-than-life big-screen adventure that makes for a perfect Dussehra family outing.

At the centre of it all is National Award winner Yami Gautam Dhar as Mohini, stepping into a completely unexpected avatar. From her striking look and body language to her comic beats and action, there’s a sense of surprise in everything she brings to the character. At an event, Yami spoke about preparing for the role and the process of creating Mohini as a completely new personality. She shared, “Har role apne saath ek naye challenges and demands lata hai. Whenever someone talks to me about preparation for a role, I go back to that memory, when you heard or read the role for the first time. Then you realise ki mazza toh bahut aa raha hai, but you also have to learn so many things: skills, action, body language. It’s like you need to create a parallel personality in front of you and then wear it as your own skin, be that person.”
She further added, “I am that kind of a student who always thinks ki tayyari mein kuch kami toh reh gayi. I truly believe that the more you read the script, the more you realise something new that can be added to your role or the storyline. It’s very important to understand the pulse of the movie. Mohini will not laugh in the same manner as my characters from other movies. I also try to add an extra element to all my characters, kuch naya, so that audiences ko dekhne mein bhi maza aaye.”

Director Balaji Mohan brings together the film’s many flavours with a distinctly Indian setting, while Aanand L. Rai’s Colour Yellow and Amazon MGM Studios come together to back a story that brings fantasy into a recognisable family world. Add G. V. Prakash Kumar’s vibrant music, including the high-energy ‘Bhabhi Tabahi’ and catchy theme track, and Nayyi Navelli becomes a celebration of mystery, action and emotion; all rolled into one big, unexpected family adventure!
Headlined by Yami Gautam Dhar, directed by Balaji Mohan and written by Himanshu Sharma and Divy Nidhi Sharma, the film also stars Addinath M Kothare, Anurag Thakur, Sunita Rajwar, Mita Vasisth, Aaditya Kulshreshth, Susmita Mukherjee and Prateek Pachori in pivotal roles. Produced by Aanand L. Rai and Himanshu Sharma, Nayyi Navelli is a G. V. Prakash Kumar musical, hitting cinemas this Dussehra on October 16!