Hyderabad: Actor and environmentalist Dia Mirza has been voicing her opinion about the way we treat our women and female characters in films. The actor, who opined that females characters in mainstream cinema are mostly mute, has expressed her views on how male stars who have crossed their 50s still insist on getting starred opposite female actors way too younger than them
When asked about her views on old actors being cast opposite younger ladies, Dia said, "It's bizarre." The actor has spoken at length to a leading daily about gender discrimination in the film industry.
Sharing her thoughts, Mirza said, "The industry is male-dominated. Older men like to be cast opposite younger women to extend their own shelf life. It is bizarre that a 50 plus something actor is acting opposite a 19-year-old actress."
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Talking about female representation on sets, Dia said, "We have more female directors, DoPs, and editors. The number is lagging far behind even now but it is definitely more from the time I started working. It is that representation that has opened up the narration but I think that the advent of the OTT platform has truly given narratives that are driven from a feminine lens are increasing manifold. I am grateful for it."
Mirza, on one hand, lauded Neena Gupta for setting a glowing example of aberration to the deep-seated ageism in the industry, but on the other hand, she also acknowledged the fact that middle-aged female actors are "struggling and aren’t being cast because no stories are being written for them."
She was last seen in Anubhav Sinha's critically acclaimed Thappad, which released earlier this year, and will next be seen in Wild Dog.
