Vidya Balan was a jury member at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. In a recent conversation, ace designer Sabyasachi recalled the backlash she faced along with him, as he was ‘blamed as a national terrorist’ for dressing her in sarees.
Sabyasachi told The Hollywood Reporter India, “I noticed most of the people attacking her were women. That was an aha moment for me: it wasn’t that they thought she was badly dressed, it was that her confidence unsettled them. Sometimes when we’re deeply unhappy with who we are, seeing someone else give themselves permission to be confident really rattles us.”
Sabyasachi had previously addressed the criticism back in 2013 right after the event, telling media outlets that she was there as a prestigious jury member and had to be dressed in a dignified manner rather than focusing on glamour.
Recalling another incident, he remembered how Vidya Balan came to him at a time when she was being severely trolled for how she was dressed.
He said, “Vidya told me that she was uncomfortable with how people treated her, and that she loved wearing saris… but felt people saw her as an ‘aunty’ for it.”
He continued, “I told her that was regressive, and that if she was confident in what she wore, she’d always be beautiful.”
Sabyasachi On Knowing Very Little Of Fashion
Being humble, Sabyasachi stated why he believed he survived.
He said, “I know very little of fashion myself. I survived and I’m successful because I know very little of fashion. I think that little distance gives me a bit of an objective view, that’s why I survived. I was in New York, I was walking by, there was a woman with her husband and she got excited seeing me and elbowed her husband. In my earshot, she tells him, ‘You know that’s Sabyasachi.’ He looks at her and says, ‘You have gone crazy, he’s so badly dressed.’ That’s my reputation.”
He added, “For instance, the Met – when the Met email came I thought it was spam. Why would they want to work with me?”
Sabyasachi further noted how he has a problem with ‘ambition’. He said, “Ambition is public, whereas excellence is private.” What keeps him happy, he explained, is doing something better today than what he did yesterday.