Catching up with Aamina Sheikh

After a sabbatical period, 2018 has emerged as the year of Aamina Sheikh who has made the most of it and has no plans of slowing down. Starting off with the highly acclaimed family drama, Asim Abbasi’s Cake, in which she starred alongside Sanam Saeed and Adnan Malik to the film making it as Pakistan’s official submission to the Oscars, she’s hit the bull’s eye.

Aamina Sheikh has proven her acting prowess time and again over an illustrious career that spans more than a decade and is a natural when it comes to acting. But, presently, she’s more focused than ever to use her influence for the greater good of society.

This summer, Sheikh became PAGE’s Global Ambassador, a non-profit organization to collectively eradicate illiteracy, particularly amongst girls, in rural areas. Aiming at helping over a million children within the next three years, Aamina hopes to extensively work towards highlighting cultural and misinterpreted religious reasons that prevent girls from receiving formal education, and minimizing such factors. Approached by the trustees to come on board, she speaks with Instep about her role and more…

“Entertainment, getting our voices out there and telling our stories establishes the narrative of whatever you’re representing and it is so important to take responsibility to elevate (the narrative of) the field and use it to instill change in society when you have established yourself in that arena,” Aamina begins. “I was already thinking along those lines, about production and how to introduce a more thoughtful narrative in our serials and films. I’ve been working on concepts and PAGE came along. I thought to myself how this would be a platform to find all those stories and project them.”

Why did Sheikh choose this particular cause came from the realization that her exposure and ability to maneuver in society has kept her at bay from a lot of things women in South Asia suffer. This also explains why she teamed up with director and activist Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy to lend her voice to an animated web-series, Aagahi that educates Pakistani women about their legal rights such as the procedure of divorce, how to file an FIR, etc.

“It all made sense to me, but my first question was, why we are not focusing on the boys? I think this whole environment of #MeToo and women empowerment, and self-defense is so essential, but all the taglines and voices further divide,” Aamina observes of how she came to understand the pertinence of female education as a priority. “We need to live in a society where both genders are living in harmonious co-existence. All the perpetrators, whether it’s #MeToo or the Zainab rape case, are men. Why aren’t we elevating and educating them? But when I had a look at the figures, I came to know how bad the situation is and we will come to that, but there needs to be a balance before we start advocating (equality).”

This also brings us to the fact that the #MeToo campaign has picked up in our part of the world as well with cases being registered on a daily-basis across the border. The movement hasn’t fully picked up in Pakistan but Aamina believes that sexual exploitation in the business is a cruel reality that needs to be addressed.

Speaking of harassment at the workplace, says Aamina, “It’s not the predominant state of being in the industry; otherwise people like us would not be there. It is improving at massive speed, but I still cannot say that it doesn’t exist. I personally have not experienced anything of such nature but I know of people who have been exploited. It does need to be tackled at several levels. As a mother, my sensitivity has increased. I’m more empathetic to younger ones and their future.”

Acting gigs

Beyond embracing altruistic roles in real life, the actress plans on spending the next quarter of the coming year on seasoned music video director, Sohail Javed’s debut feature film, Sorry: A Love Story. The peculiarly titled offering is being produced by actor, host and producer Faysal Quraishi, and co-penned by Javed with Asma Nabeel of Khaani and Maan Jao Na fame. Co-starring Aamina alongside Zahid Ahmed, Sonya Hussyn and Quraishi, Sorry is described as an intense romance with light-hearted moments. It is said to be a film that revolves around the individual journey of four protagonists who end up crossing paths.

“When I came back to Karachi from the US, I was approached by Sohail Javed,” begins Aamina about how she went on to sign Sorry (the film). “We sat down and he gave me a synopsis and while he was giving me a narration, I was completely engrossed in the story because it came from a very personal space for him.”

Despite having a reputation for being extremely selective, Aamina notes, “Anything that has the power to move you… and so it intrigued me but even then I wanted to read the script before I decided. Until it was ready, he kept updating me with the developments.”

With more than 300-music-videos to his credit, Aamina believes Sohail has a “knack for rhythm and timing.” Having collaborated with him earlier for a beauty-reality show, the actress praises his passion for the story and how the team came together. “Asma has made some leaps and bounds after her experience with cancer. She’s really streamlined her creativity in a very powerful way. I found it as a very interesting combination of her and Sohail,” she says, commenting on how the script came at par with the initial narration.

It also led her to discover that Faysal Quraishi has his own production house. “He’s a veteran and has been around for so long and for him to take this step means that he finds Sorry meaningful,” she adds, listing the pros that contributed to her decision to say yes to the film.

The casting played a role as well. “When I asked about the rest of the cast, I felt how brilliant it was to have Sonya and Zahid on-board. They were all good flags; it all came together well and it’s a good space to be in for an actor.”

Before the film goes on floors mid-January, the script-reading sessions are going on in with the titular cast.

Having spent the summer in New York and Los Angeles, Aamina is now hoping to step outside of her comfort zone. Though she plans on leaving behind no opportunities depending on “relevance and content”, she does have her eyes set on making her presence felt globally.

“For me, what’s next is the globe, really. I’ve been auditioning in the US; I go back and forth quite a bit. I’ve spent a lot of my time growing up there, so I have a lot of friends and family there who I visit,” comments Aamina.

She adds on a parting note, “I do plan on getting more international projects, move to a more global arena and put Pakistan on the map in that way also. Our industry is very small in the larger scheme of things. It’s great we’ve done so much, but we need to look at it from a bigger perspective. With online streaming, as an actor, you need to be in the palm of people all over the world, if India can have an original Netflix series, so can Pakistan.”