For those who turned into the fifth and penultimate episode of Dune: Prophecy, they saw the bombshell entrance of Sister Francesca, played by Tabu, the popular Indian actress. It’s a crucial moment in the series, introducing a surprise character with a major impact on the series.
Tabu was, in fact, requested for the role by showrunner and executive producer Alison Schapker and director Anna Foerster, pulling her into what is becoming one of the most successful franchises in the world. The Escapist got a chance to talk with Tabu and discover what it was like joining the series, how Dune is perceived in India, and, of course, how she nailed that entrance.
Matthew Razak (MR): I’m glad we could talk. I actually just watched the season finale about an hour ago.
Tabu: You did? what did you think?
MR: It was great. The whole run time of that last one is intense. Have you seen it?
Tabu: Oh, no. So I have these screenings every week, like these private screenings, all my family, my friends, my nephew, his friends and all, and we get together and we have a watch party every week and for (episodes) five and six, I’ve booked like this nice private theater.
MR: That was actually one of the questions I had was about the cinematic quality of the show. I was watching on TV and, throughout the entire series, was thinking this would look incredible on the big screen visually.
Tabu: Definitely. I think seeing it theatrically should be a lot of fun.
MR: It looked like you were on set – like in physical sets – for most of your work and that the series had a lot of physical sets.
Tabu: Yes, because most of my part was in the palace, right? Not a lot of green screen for me.
MR: It must be nice to come into such a big show but still shoot in that physical space. Can you talk a bit about how that impacts your performance to actually have that physical location?
Tabu: It does. It does. And I think the first time I experienced this on such a big magnitude was during Life of Pi, where we shot most of the stuff on green and blue because of the ocean and the tiger and everything. And it felt a little removed, and I could tell the difference because when we shot the home scenes and the house scenes; it was a different experience compared to when we shot those.
But coming back to Dune, I think I got lucky because most of my scenes are relational. It’s about the relationships. And that’s the best thing I like about my part is that it’s personal, it’s all hard, and it’s intimate. So, you can really go through the nuances of the relationships, the performances. I love that (physical set) part.
Related: Dune: Prophecy Season 1, Episode 4 Ending Explained – What’s the Deal With Sister Theodosia?
Except for the part where, of course, with my entrance and when I come down from the spaceship and all of that was not set. But even that was very, very human because there were so many people. I didn’t even feel like I’m coming down from a spaceship because actually what I saw around me was space and sky and all of that similar to what it was going to be, how it was going to translate on screen.
MR: You’re teeing up my questions wonderfully. You do get to make an entrance. You probably have the entrance of the series, right? Can you talk a bit about that? That’s something you get to do in roles but part there’s sort of two layers to it, right? There’s the entrance of your character into the show and then there’s the entrance of you, the actress, the well-known, internationally famous person, which is a subtext for an entrance like that.
Is it just the character when you’re doing a performance like that or do you kind of have in the back of your mind that it’s also you?
Tabu: So it’s me. That has become a sum total of all that I am, what I do, who I am, and all of that. But also the character, in this case, the character needed that kind of entrance because that’s the kind of impact and that’s the kind of statement that this character is going to make in the story. And Alison had a vision of my entrance. When it’s written on paper, it’s a different thing, but she had imagined this, and she was literally all in. Like they say, “The money was on this shot” for her because there is a build-up. Because what Francesca is going to do in this story is so big that it had to be the prelude to her story had to be so grand. Otherwise, her character becomes small and unimpactful.
But back to your question, this is about the character and about me. You cannot deny that every actor loves a great entry. I think it’s a treat for any actor to get an entry like that in a film or project on screen because it shows the stature of your character and the stature of maybe who you are if they are thinking of that. It elevates you on screen.
Of course, as an actor, I want to do complete justice to that start and to the way they have imagined it and the way they have designed it. I can’t be like, OK, I’m just walking through the entrance. My performance has to match the stature of the shot.
MR: You noted that your character is an emotional storyline. I think she has the most complete story arc for this season. Can you sort of talk about playing a really personal character in a very grand show?
Tabu: I always felt like Francesca’s world is different from the world that you see in the show so far. Most of the time, it doesn’t feel like she’s part of the big game. You know, there’s a time you feel that she’s really entangled in this whole mesh of deceit and lies and all of that.
When we were talking before we started shooting, when we were sitting and discussing the line that came out from me was that Francesca lives from her heart … that’s what I held on to and that’s what I played upon in my character. But there are also gray areas, so you don’t know whether she’s actually playing the emperor or she’s actually feeling all those things or it’s part of a bigger plan. And I had the choice of leaving it open for the audience to interpret or playing it in a way that it’s clear that she’s playing him.
I guess Francesca is so emotion, emotion, emotion that I don’t know if the audience is ever going to feel that she was playing the emperor. That’s what I love about Francesca; that even though there is a possibility of it going gray, I don’t think it goes gray.
MR: Can you talk a bit about, you know, you’re playing a role that’s played by two? You and someone else (Charithra Chandran) in this series? How do you go about doing that? Matching two performances from two different people?
Tabu: We had a couple of meetings with Charithra, who was playing my younger part. I think she had to do the work of matching her accent to mine because she has a British accent. I have an Indian accent so there is no way that I could have designed the British accent for myself. It wouldn’t work. I think she matched her accent to match mine. Her accent and mine could match because in India, we have studied in a convent and the missionary schools that were established by the British. So, somewhere, I think the way we speak has more of British influence than American.
It is a little weird to play a different person, grown up and you’ve not lived through that journey of that person as an actor, as a character, as a person. I guess that’s the magic of cinema and of storytelling and of the filmmakers that make it look seamless.
MR: Can you talk about Dune in India? Is it the same sort of cultural phenomenon? This massive science fiction thing based on this almost mythical tome.
Tabu: Yeah, it is, especially with the younger generation, of course, because Timothy Chalamet and Zendaya have a huge fan following. The younger generation, there’s a huge fan following of Dune, and not just in the younger generation, in the media, and the cinema lovers and film enthusiasts, and especially sci-fi enthusiasts.
Actually, having said that, because Dune is not your regular typical sci-fi film, right? So it really speaks to a lot of people who are not a sci-fi audience. I think that’s the added advantage that Dune has. Of course, visual people like to watch big-screen entertainment with these special effects and big stories and all of that. It’s a big franchise here.
MR: This is a female-created, mostly female-directed series with a cast of lead characters that are women. Not just that, but mature women. It’s such a rarity for television, film, anything. Was that part of what enticed you? And what did it mean to you to be in a series like that?
Tabu: Absolutely. The fact that this show was based on the book called Sisterhood of Dune. You knew that there is no other way this show is going to go. There are going to be women at the center of it and to belong to that whole legacy of the Bene Gesserit, I think, for an actor, for a female actor, it is the most attractive and most interesting factor and easy to say yes to it.
Of course, the character is so beautiful. I’m sure every actor on this show will have the same answer that whatever screen time they have the material that they were given to do was brilliant. It’s a dream and, like you said, it’s a rarity.
Dune: Prophecy is currently airing on HBO and Max, with new episodes dropping Sundays.
Published: Dec 15, 2024 10:06 pm