I don’t think there should ever be an age for starting something,” she said.

“All these checklists, I just don’t get it. Who says that you can’t start new things when you’re 30 or 40 or 50… or 60?”

If women watching her take that leap feel encouraged, she’s happy.

Ashish: ‘I had no plans to act’

Ashish’s route to Thudakkam was almost the opposite.

“I didn’t have any plans to act. To be honest, that’s the complete honest truth,” he said.

The confidence shown in him by the director and his family helped convince him that he might fit the character. But he is remarkably candid about the biggest reason he finally agreed.

“If Vismaya wasn’t part of this movie, there was a high chance, or most probably, I would have said no because I had no plans to act,” Ashish said.

“We all love her so much, and she’s such an amazing person.”

It’s one of those moments that explains all the “Maya Chechi” and “Joko” business better than any carefully packaged answer about co-star chemistry could.

That affection is very much mutual.

Ashish plays a deeply disturbing man with remarkably little dialogue, meaning the menace has to come largely through his physicality, his eyes and his stillness.

Vismaya couldn’t stop praising him.

“He has really good control with his body language,” she said.

“I was in awe. From every scene that I saw him in, he’s so menacing.”

Perhaps the biggest compliment to Ashish is how far removed that character seems from the genial young man sitting beside Vismaya during the interview.

His preparation, however, took him into considerably darker territory.

When the conversation turned to true-crime documentaries and portrayals of cold-blooded killers with little apparent remorse, Ashish revealed that he had been watching them too.