Two-and-a-half years down the line and still no new Tabassum Hashmi movie. The actress appears to be parked more frequently in the Hyderabad villa she designed for herself, than in her roomy Mumbai apartment where she lived with her mother.

The comedy Bandaa Yeh Bindaas Hai, produced by Ravi Chopra, featured her in the Oscar-winning role played by Marisa Tomei in the original Hollywood movie My Cousin Vinny. Its release had been delayed because a legal case had been filed against the Hindi version for plagiarism. That imbroglio has been sorted, so Tabu just might be seen in a movie by the year’s end. Reports are that next year she will act opposite Amitabh Bachchan  and Aamir Khan for the first time if Priyadarshan’s plans to cast them together materialise.

Meanwhile, the 30-something bachelorette has become a voracious reader of fairy tales and Hinglish literature. She’s convinced she can be a super ‘it’ girl if she is allowed to shake her booty and hates it whenever she is asked who her new manfriend is, when she plans to marry and what her next great movie project will be, maybe because she sees no need to plot either her life or career.

Incidentally of late, she’s being badgered  again about her ‘friendship’ with the Hyderabad-based Nagarjuna. The married actor and Tabu have been gossiped about for nearly a decade now.

On a professional front, Tabu last attracted rave reviews for her tour de force performance in The Namesake as a Bengali girl who migrates to the US after marriage. She can ask for any role of substance in any movie today, so why doesn’t she?

Tabu, nicknamed Tabs, Tabdi or T,  does not discuss such questions. She’d rather discuss the weather or literature. She could have cashed in on her National Awards for Maachis and Chandni Bar, but she didn’t. She could have become the next Smita Patil, but she didn’t. Okay, so I’m still wary 
of calling her up for a chat and asking, “T, what’s up?” She doesn’t have great phone manners, but when it comes to the texting route, she’s okay. Every message is instantly answered, and with the correct spellings.

The first time I saw T was because of a delayed flight.  The closest spot to grab a decent breakfast was at Shabana Azmi’s Janki Kutir open-house. There she was fetching bhurji and baasi rotis. Head covered with a dupatta, the most impish smile on her face since a Walt Disney goblin, Tabu’s was a striking presence.

She appeared as a raped schoolgirl in Dev Anand’s shuddersome Hum Naujawan. Whenever she’s reminded of that performance, she giggles, “I didn’t even know what rape meant.” A part of her was demoralised  when the Boney Kapoor-produced Prem took eons to get to the cinema halls.

A binding contract and a liaison with her screen hero, Sanjay Kapoor, couldn’t exactly have been good times for the girl from Hyderabad.

She returned as an incarnation of Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday opposite Rishi Kapoor in Manmohan Singh’s  pretty tedious Pehla Pehla Pyaar.

Tabu has remained fiercely loyal to her early directors — Manmohan Singh, Priyadarshan (who directed her in Sazaa–e-Kaalapani), and K Raghavendra Rao who directed her in Telugu films and some of their Hindi remakes. Mention the names of these directors and she’ll go, “Haaaai, they were so nice to me when others weren’t.”

There’s a sting there, but she won’t elaborate.

I’m sure she would have loved to be cast opposite Shah Rukh, Aamir and Salman Khan, but she’s too tall for them at 5ft 10in.

She’s made the most compatible pair so far with Ajay Devgan (Vijaypath and Haqeeqat) and actually needs no male support as evidenced in Astitva, which showcased her best performance. She’s not afraid to age in a business where most heroines believe that to play a mother means digging your own grave.

While working with her on Silsilay, I did not  pry into her personal life. She does not like to talk beyond telling you that her father was an Iranian who abandoned her mother and she was brought up in a matriarchal household. The ground for Tabu’s career was laid by her elder sister, Farhah, known for her spitfire ways in the 1980s.

Mostly, Tabu has a talent for getting into relationships with men unequal to her. From what I’ve seen, she seemed to be at her happiest when she was seeing Milind Soman (never mind her denials in print). She’s a woman of sensuality, but I suspect she is not the marrying kind, unless the man does that typical number of sweeping her off her feet.

She’s a gifted photographer and I’ve seen her photos, which are mainly street shots. She writes essays, poetry and short stories, but does not want to publish any of them. Why?  Her reply is, “I don’t think they are good enough.”

That’s Tabu for you, selling herself short once again.

(The writer has been reviewing Bollywood ever since he was in diapers. He has also scripted three films and directed three including Fiza. Currently, he is working on his next film Rutba)