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How to Dress Like Your Favourite Bollywood Character

How to Dress Like Your Favourite Bollywood Character

Rashmi Daryanani
Team MissMalini

One of the best things about being part of Team MissMalini is that we can kind of show up to the office wearing anything. However, it’s nice to put some thought into your outfits every once in a while, so we decided to do dress-up days. But of course, since we’re us, we can’t really do it the “normal” way by just being a bit more formal – instead, we had to go with a theme! For our first dress-up day, Karen Alfonso picked the theme and she went with “Bollywood characters from the 50s to the 90s.” Check out all our outfits and hear from everyone on how they put together their look!

MissMalini – Anjali from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai

MissMalini

MissMalini says:
Picking a Bollywood favorite from the 50s to the 90s is nearly impossible but for some reason I’ve always loved Kajol’s sporty spice vibe in Kuch Kuch Hota Hai AND I’ve been wondering what I would look like in a bob cut 🙂 as luck would have it my stylist Marv had green dungarees and my friend Akash Jain works for the NBA (that’s where the basketball came from)… throw on sneakers and a headband, and boom you’ve got Anjali! In fact she was such a popular choice that 2 other members of Team MissMalini chose the same character!

Super fun Bollywood dressup fun at MissMalini HQ today, can’t wait for the next one!

Nowshad Rizwanullah – Munna from Rangeela

Nowshad Rizwanullah

Nowshad Rizwanullah says:

Someone in our office suggested Aamir Khan’s character in Rangeela. It sounded fun and very Bollywood! Marv managed to get me the bullet holed ‘banyan’ and a funky orange shirt with some accessories to match the look. And like a true actor, I clearly dove into my character.

Mike Melli – Lakhan from Biwi No 1

Mike Melli

Mike Melli says:

I had some help coming up with the costume. It was last minute and I knew we’d have a laugh about it. I was Anil Kapoor channeling Daler Mehendi in Biwi No.1. Marv had this blue cloak-like coat in his wardrobe (I don’t know why), which I borrowed and we tried our best to tie the turban. We almost managed… almost!

Amruta Khatavkar – Simran from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge

Amruta Khatavkar

Amruta Khatavkar says:
I’ve grown up watching DDLJ and Simran has been my most favourite Bollywood female character ever since I remember. I thought it’ll be fun to get a chance to be her for a day so I decided to wear my white tee, brown dress, nerdy glasses and my tan crossbody-bag. I am forever looking for my Raj and hope to find him someday!

Ranjit Rodricks – Iqbal from Coolie

Ranjit Rodricks

Ranjit Rodricks says:

When my colleague Karen suggested that the theme for our first fancy dress day in office has to be based on a Bollywood film character from the 50’s to the 90’s, I was most irritated since I don’t have any Bollywood background. In thirty-nine years of my life, I’ve probably watched just ten Bollywood films. Hence, it was difficult for me to reference an iconic screen character.

My colleague Rashmi tried to help me out with ideas like Aamir Khan in Ghulam or Anil Kapoor in 1942 A Love Story, but I was not convinced. So, the night before, on a whim I decided to channel Bollywood’s biggest icon – Amitabh Bachchan. And it was only obvious that I had to dress up as his character in Coolie since that was a film that nearly cost him his life and in fact, gave him a re-birth.

I then headed to a film costume shop near Lokhandwala Complex and rented the “Coolie” outfit with the arm-tab et al.

And what was the lesson I learnt from playing dress up? Don’t be negative because even dark clouds have a silver lining (in this case, a fat voucher from Flipkart as my 1st prize).

Dhruvi Shah – Anjali from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai

Dhruvi Shah

Dhruvi Shah says:
I literally scrummaged for ideas the night before the Bollywood dress up day. I wanted to work with my hair length and the character that came to mind was Anjali from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai. The toughie was looking for a track suit with a visible branding. I fished out, from the back of my closet, a track suit I had purchased when I was in school! I added a hair-band and completed the look with sneakers from my college days. And lastly, I sourced a basketball from my 7 year old nephew. It was awesome to come to work and find 2 more Anjalis from different timelines of the film.

Karen Alfonso – Janice from Hare Rama Hare Krishna

Karen Alfonso

Karen Alfonso says:

I borrowed my mom’s multi coloured kurti and layered a beaded necklace in place of the rudraksha beads. Oversized sunnies never go out of style, so I perched them atop my head. Black kaajal lined my eyes while I kept my lips bare. The finishing touch was the bindi.

Marv D’Souza – Arjun/Vijay from Karan Arjun

Marv D’Souza

Marv D’Souza says:

I came as Shah Rukh’s character in Karan Arjun. I had a brown leather jacket that I haven’t found an occasion to wear, and this seemed like the perfect excuse! Fake leather jacket and chunky boots, seemed pretty much close to the costume in the 90s for the heros. And turns out, I happened to be Shah Rukh’s characters from MOST of his films in the 90’s!!

Rashmi Daryanani – Rashmi from Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak

Rashmi Daryanani

Rashmi Daryanani says:

When I first heard the theme, there were a lot of characters that ran through my head -Simran from DDLJ being the first one. However, I was drawn to Juhi from QSQT because I was sort of named after her character! (When it came to naming me, my mom remembered the name ‘Rashmi’ thanks to QSQT and went with it.)

It wasn’t too hard to ape her look – for a scene in the film (the Kahe Sataye song), Juhi is wearing a white churidaar-kurta with a red bandini dupatta. I borrowed the kurta from my mom and the dupatta from my aunt, and I was all set! To complete the look, I went with her trademark braided pigtails, threw on a few bangles and put on a bindi (which I bought on a Mumbai local). She doesn’t wear too much make-up in the film besides red lips, so I skipped lining my eyes and just went with foundation and highlighter.

Khyati Gandhi – Little Anjali from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai

Khyati Gandhi

Khyati Gandhi says:

I thought of Little Anjali because she’s cute, and when I was in school I also got a haircut like hers! I kept my look simple and went with a pink top, white skirt and thick headband, since that gives a “girly cute” vibe that you’d associate with her. I’m also the youngest girl on Team MissMalini, so I guess it fit!

There you have it! That’s a round-up of our ten looks, so in case you were looking for inspiration for Halloween this year, these are some options you can explore. And in case you want to go a step further and actually ape your character in their behavioural pattern, then don’t worry, we’ve got you covered there too. We got into the skin of our characters for a fun little video – check out our stint in front of the camera!

But no, we weren’t born such… uh, natural performers. There are quite a few bloopers too! Wanna see?

Ranjit emerged the winner from our internal voting, but now we’ll ask you – do you like our looks?! Which one is your favourite? Will you be trying out any? Tell us, tell us!

More pix here:

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Pix: MissMalini and Khyati Gandhi