One of the fresh faces that we can catch on the small screen these days is makeup artist turned actor Zoya Nasir, who is starring opposite Junaid Khan in drama serial Hania.
Presently on-air, the play features her as a wife to an abusive husband who tortures her all the time. Zoya pulls off the role of a petrified wife really well.
Instep caught up with the artist to find out about her acting debut, how she landed the role of Hania and what her future plans are.
“My father Nasir Adeeb makes movies so I basically grew up on sets,” she shared in an exclusive conversation with Instep, adding that her father, who is the writer of the old and the upcoming version of Maula Jatt, helps her master the craft. “The passion and love for acting, the creativity was already in me. My mom, on the other hand, owns salons in about three continents so I had that element in me as well.”
“However, around the ‘90s, acting was never even an option to be considered as it was frowned upon back in the days,” she continued. “So, I leaned on to the beautician part and channeled my love for acting, poetry and music into painting canvases. That was suppressed but I always knew I wanted to be an artist.”
Zoya informed that she moved to England and turned to product development for a makeup company there; she then went to America and opened up two salons there. She also acquired a degree in cosmetology but shifted back to Pakistan sometime back. While working at a local salon, Zoya somehow bagged the opportunity to act and accepted the offer once her father gave her a go-ahead.
“Art is in my blood, it runs in the family,” Zoya expressed. “I had already rejected two roles but I took up the third one (Hania) after I had my father’s nod. Hania is very close to my heart. It is about a girl who was trapped in an abusive marriage only because of ‘log kiya kahenge’. I, being a divorcee, had to go through that myself.
I was lucky enough to have a strong family that stood by my side. But, there are so many girls who do not have that support. I wanted to do this one because our television is like a family member and a lot of plays are being made on social messages that hit home and our masses relate to it.”
Speaking of her character, Zoya said, “The emotional graph of this character was very difficult so all I had to do was be compassionate to every other girl who I knew was unluckier than me. I thought Hania can give a little bit of courage to those girls who are unable to take a stand for themselves. She started off as a naive girl but later on she gathers the courage to take a stand for herself.”
Hania is getting rave reviews and has been generating high ratings ever since it went on-air. According to Zoya, she has been getting good feedback and she is grateful that her potential is being noticed.
While Zoya has signed on for her next TV project, she also works at her mother’s salon simultaneously. She has three salons in Miami, Boston and New York and she visits America every summer to look after them.
“The transition has been very surreal; I love both the professions that I have adapted,” Zoya maintained, while informing that once she is able to make a mark on television, she would love to make her big screen debut.
