-Raghuvendra Singh
Do you feel empty inside heart?
People think that having a certain amount of money and people in the society recognising your worth and then having a good family are the standards of good living but they are not. Every individual is unique, we are trying to figure out ourselves just because we tell them this is right, this is wrong, doesn’t mean the things will become right and wrong for everyone. It’s just that he is exploring his own life. He is concern about his own life. He will do what he wants to do. There is no right, no wrong. What people think of me I have nothing to do with that. I have no goals to achieve. I have nothing to prove to anyone. I don’t fear losing everything that I have and I could be the biggest star of this country. No matter what happens I will be the same excited curious guy that I am right now, that I was back way and this will keep me going. No amount of thappa from society or from the industry can change the way I feel everyday. I don’t want acceptance.
Your detractors believe success has made you arrogant…
You only see things that you expect to see. We’re wired to think like that. So from a general point of view, for someone who had nothing and who has suddenly tasted success, the normal expectation would be that he will flip and grow arrogant. Even actors are aware of this fact. Perhaps, that’s why some of them just put on a charade of humility. But I’m not someone who has thought about all this. I’ve always been what I am.
Is your honesty then misconstrued?
It’s more to do with the kind of questions that you’re asking me and the kind of answers I’d like to give. Also, I’ve always been confident about my work. But now when I sound confident it comes across as arrogance. Now when I say that I don’t want to give an opinion, it means something else. Now if I’m exhausted and I’m late for something - and I hate being late - and somebody asks for a picture and I refuse, it is viewed as stupid. So it’s all about what I’m in your head. And that’s your headache. My headache is that I like it when I’m being understood. Since that doesn’t happen normally in real life, I try to do that through my films and characters.
Anything you’d like to change about yourself?
I’m a much better guy from what I was four years back. I was extremely ambitious. But things that once seemed impossible happened. I grew confident. I was enjoying what I was doing. But at the same time I was too obsessed about future. But today I don’t invest my energy in thinking about it. I now live in present.
Do you think you are as good marketer as good actor you are?
I don’t know how to sell. To be a good marketer you need to be a good liar (Laughs). And you need to be a good negotiator. And you should have great communication skill. Also, if you are very actively engaged in the marketing of the film then you are also required to come up with the creative ideas. Now since 2009 from Ra.one the audiences has gotten immune to the kind of marketing we do. Every product says the mine is best product, take it. So we get immune to it. So come up with innovative ideas that you grab three seconds of real attention of the audience. There are stages. So first you have to create awareness that the film has come. That we can do it with TV and probably with mobile because now most public is there. But once awareness is done then how to translate into foot falls in the theatre. It all comes back to how the trailer is. Word of mouth really helps. We think that entire janta is on internet, they are on Twitter, Instagram and all this but only less than seven percent of movie watching audience is on internet. So rest of the ninety three percent would obviously are aware of your movie that’s releasing on a particular date is on the rotations on TV and Radio. But it all comes back to the trailer. If I will like the trailer I would recommend it to my friend and that recommendation is what will give you footfalls.
What is the weirdest thing you have found about yourself on google or on social media platforms?
The thing is Instagram is so huge because people love themselves. It is a fact. The whole momentum and drive on society before this was to do something in your career probably or in your class that you get acknowledgement. So for that acknowledgement there was a great momentum of working hard and all those things and those are important things in our society. Now what these platforms have done… it is short circuited the reward thing. So now what you do is you click your picture and put that on Instagram and you start getting likes and it makes a sound TING. There is a term used in psychology called Pavlov’s Dogs. So every time Pavlov use to feed the do, he use to ring a bell, TING. So after certain repetition on the fifth day there was no food but he was doing ting and the dog was salivating. Because he has associated ting with that. So now this immediate constant acknowledgment or validation is why we are hooked. Even if we are getting bored then you will click a selfie, put it up, somebody will like it because they also want to be liked by you when they put up (Laughs). That’s what is happening. Twitter is you have a platform where there is this research done Howard… there is one group of intelligent students who were told that we will pay you this amount, you just have to sit and listen and the group b was we will pay you half of the price but you can talk about yourself. You have no idea half of group went to group b. they were happy with taking half amount of the money but they wanted to talk about themselves and not listen. So Twitter is a platform where people can talk. So people would sue all these platforms to give their opinions strongly even if they don’t have opinions. So you can’t tale all these platforms seriously.
Now we see you at all big parties of the industry, be it Karan Johar or Manish Malhotra. Now do you feel part of the industry or you still feel outsider?
I don’t know how insiders feel. I feel people are generally when we talk about nepotism and insider and outsider, we get slightly confused. We think that nepotism means that star kids are given more films probably or they have easy first film and outsiders don’t get it easily. This is like broad way of defining nepotism, insider and outsider. Many things that could reflect you are not being film industry in like your success could be just multiplied by ten times and everybody would. So it’s slight confirmation by us. There are four good performances but everyone from the industry is saying that C has performed well. Obviously C has performed well because ABD has performed well but everyone is saying C has performed well. So C will get the award and nobody can say that no, that’s not right because C has performed well. But even AB and D have performed well. So even that could be taken as nepotism or probably say that A’s film has released, it’s very good. It’s looking promising. But nobody comes and validates that on public platforms. Even that is nepotism. If you sit down and if you start cribbing about oh, I’m still not an insider. It doesn’t mean anything. It’s largely depends on one if you look at certain way then it is all commerce. After a point of time if a producer thinks that I’ll put two rupees and I will get back five rupees from this guy. No matter you are his friend or he is your godfather or you don’t get along, he will still take you (Laughs). And if that’s not working then no matter if you are somebody’s son but after a point they will stop taking you because ultimately it’s commerce. So it is as simple mathematic as this. And there many parameters you would ask me that what did you do right to be here and I will give you a story. Probably I like taking risks, I quit things at the peak. So I’ll give you a story which will look very good and logical also. But let me tell you one thing that there are many guys who are very good actors because I have seen that when I was doing theatre. They were good looking and younger but I never saw them again neither on TV neither in films. So the only thing you can feel right now with everything you have done probably making sense and logic you need to feel greatful that you are here. There are only two or three parameters you can take care of. Ok, I will work hard, I’ll be professional, all that shit but there are many things you are not in control of and if you are getting the kind of films in the industry that you really want to do, just smile and be grateful and do not think about insider and outsider.
Do you think industry is still taking time to accept your success and stardom?
Right from the time I have started doing films in 2013 till now I have been getting the films that I want to do. It’s not that I’m choosing the best films out of options that I’m getting and I’m doing those films but these are actually the films I always want to do at that point of time. So looking from that point of view I don’t think that they are having trouble in accepting me. Otherwise I wouldn’t be getting any offers. And these kind of films I really want to do. As far as stardom is concerned I don’t care about stardom. So I don’t know what they are thinking and even if they are thinking that I am a star or not a star it doesn’t change anything. I don’t get a kick when you call me a celestial body or star or whatever you can call me. It doesn’t do anything to me.
Do you think you have hit the big league with MS Dhoni?
I don’t understand what big league is! Am I getting the money that I want to? Fuck, yes. I’m getting those moneys and I don’t know what to do with it. So I have formed a team and we are making small budget films to start with. So I’m investing that money that I don’t know what to do with. It’s not that it’s too much and I don’t know what to do, especially with the recent developments (Laughs) but yeah there is certain money that I need for myself every month and I don’t know what to do with the rest of money, I don’t want to let it be there and multiply for future me. So I’m investing in all those small budget films, I think makes sense to me. I think this is the biggest league. So if you want to have 100 crores and you are getting five crores you are doomed. If you want to have five crores and you are getting five plus something crores, you are the biggest league itself. So I think I’m the biggest league that I could be in.
Do you believe in big league, A grade and superstar and all these things?
I know there are people, there are certain kind of media they do these kind of rankings. So for them it’s very relevant but that’s what I’m saying, there is no differentiation. If I was not getting the kind of money that I really deserve in the sense of the kind of effort I’m putting in, the kind of time I’m investing or probably I’m not getting the kind of films that I want to do. Then I would say that oh, it exists. But even when I was a TV actor I wanted to do films I did the films I wanted to, even when my first and second film did well I wanted to do Byomkesh Bakshy and Paani. Even when Byomkesh did not do well at the box-office I got Dhoni and before it got released I signed five films and those films that I wanted to do. I can’t differentiate. I’m still figuring why I said yes to all these films. I’m allowed to talk about only two films. One is Dhamra’s film that Tarun Mansukhani would be directing and the other Viki Rajani is producing with Eros and Sanjay Puran Singh Chauhan will direct.
Are you in a happy space in life and career right now?
For me happiness whatever it was illusive all the while because I was always like one day I will become happy and for that I need to work today. This was our conditioning right from the time we were kids. But with experience I have realized that the closest syndrome of happiness is excitement. It can be anything. It can be playing a video game or it can be talking to you at this point of time. If I’m excited it means I’m closest to the sense of happiness. Am I excited? If this is the question you are asking. I’m damn excited. You can take away each and everything that I have gotten and I don’t know what to do with it but you cannot take the excitement in me. You give me the best of the films I’ll be very excited. If I don’t get any films and I have time I’ll do a play as I’m doing up right now, I’ll do a play and I will be equally excited. You cannot take that excitement from me. And the day I decide to quite performing art as an actor and I think that I want to become a somebody I’ll be excited for that. And I won’t think twice. I have done in my life similar things like many times. Everything I do or I not do the reason is excitement.
Is there a sense of security now?
My tweet the other day was the fear if not being successful is the most it can get is at par otherwise it’s less than the fear of losing out on things after being successful. So success in terms that we define does not give you security. It can only make you more insecure if you are thinking about the future. Because you want now to hold on to things and you are not completely hundred percent sure why you have got it? You can manufacture causes but you are not hundred percent sure. So now you don’t know, you just want to hold on to it. You are damn insecure. I don’t have any films. I’m a struggler. I have nothing to lose but I have a fear of not getting a film in the future. I have four films right now and I’m thinking what if my first film only doesn’t do well then all the three producers will ran away. I have something to lose. So security doesn’t come with success. Obsession with the future is the cause of security and I’m just not obsessed.
How come the idea of film production came into your mind? Isn’t too early?
After a point what happens is the kind of money you need until and unless you are thinking you are getting psychological security but you are not getting actually. After a point when you can do everything every day that you want to do money loses it’s relevance in your head. You don’t know what to do with it. So my idea is if money is flowing from irrelevance to relevance is always a very good idea. If you are willing to take the risk because that’s irrelevant money but you are also thinking that probably it will come back. Even if it doesn’t I don’t care because I have the relevant money with me. So I thought when I was growing up when I had a big family and I wanted to go somewhere to study in some university and I could not go because we didn’t have that much of money. I was like I cannot do something right now that I really want to do because of something that I cannot possibly earn at this point of time. This is not a fair world. So money is very important for people who don’t have it. But once you have it there is thresh hold after that it… then it becomes relevant only when it flows from I don’t need it, you need it and I will see whether I want to back your film or not. It should resonate. I will see that, I will give you money to make that film, also probably have a kind of setup that can probably make some money if it doesn’t, I don’t care a fuck. Ten years back if I needed money, if I could myself money ten years back I would be like wow because in ten years I will get this kind of money but that was very important at that point of time, you need to realize that. So I’m just screening out probably the best film I can find and those people don’t have money to make it. It has nothing to do with oh want to be the torchbearer and good films should be made. Make shitty films I don’t care a fuck, I swear. It has nothing to do with that. I enjoy reading scripts. So I’m getting excitement in reading the scripts and then I;m like ok, I don’t need this, you can take it, make your film and probably I will have a set up in which we secure money or make profit. Then I will watch those films. That is excitement for me. I’m just a conversion machine from money to excitement.
Do you think everyone needs a godfather in this industry to become successful?
I don’t think everyone needs a godfather. I don’t have any godfather in the industry. There are so many people, so many actors in the past; they don’t need a godfather to be succeeded in the industry. If you have and if you can give me one, please give me because it will help me but then with or without godfather I think I can survive. Because ultimately it’s the kind of projects you choose and whether people are interested in watching them or not. So somehow you can choose in your initial years, because you don’t have that pull, if you can choose the right filmmakers and the right films and somehow draw the line between what people want and what are the films that you want to do, then I don’t think anybody can stop you until and unless you are too lucky and I don’t believe in luck.
Isn’t it difficult to understand what is right and what is wrong for you in this business?
We confuse things. Bachpan mein hum kisi bhi cheez par jaldi react karte hain, there are things we want to do, there are things that we just don’t want to do, but later when we start growing we start confusing things. I call it paralysis by analysis. We analyze and paralysis ourselves. Isliye problem hone lagti hai. See the thing is ek Friday ko film release hogi, hit hogi to do din main bahut maze karoonga, picture kharab hogi to do din mujhe bahut dhakka lagega. Lekin Monday se main phir usi neutral state mein aa jata hoon. Lekin wo film banaane ke chakkar mein I invest around six to eight months. To kya vo do din important hain? Mere producer ke liye bahut important hain. And that six-eight months which I’m giving of my life to a film. So what is the most important thing? So should I analyze these six-eight months or be sacred about what would be faith of the film or should I be excited? When I say excited that means you are not forcing yourself to be excited. It is an excitement like I slept I 7am and I got up at 9.30 am. So this is excitement for me. If you are excited for the project you have chosen and because of the story, I’m not saying because of the other things then you are on the right track. At the same time you have to make sure that what you are choosing for yourself in order to excited, in order to prove is also with yourselves commercially viable. People want to see it. So it has to be balance between both.
Being an outsider don’t you feel need of a person who can guide you?
Of course! You talk to people, you make friends and they are experienced and you are intelligent enough to scream out to least important things, understand what to take from, there is no secret which will see you through. There are many things that work, there are many things that don’t work. It’s also depends on the personality that you are. So there is no secret. What is right for you is important but yes there are certain wrongs that you should not do. Like you should not be not professional. Yes few things that people can tell you and you can understand that after working few months in the industry. So that’s not a rocket science. So yes for that feedback and people from experience can guide you. but it’s not mandatory or compulsory because you can figure it out from talking to people and you can figure out the right way to go into the industry. There is no set path. Mostly it depends on your reason why you want to be an actor or a filmmaker. There are three things and it’s a very simple thing but in any form, in any industry, whether you are engineer, doctor or scientist or actor, there are three things that people slightly confuse it and that are why they are confused, insecure or they can be happy but they don’t know why. Reason is almost 90-95 percent people know what they want to do almost. Now a fraction of that ninety percent of the people don’t know how they want to do it. It’s like half of those ninety percent, they somehow know how to do it and half of that half that means one forth may be or less than that knows why do they want to do it. So if you have got your why in place then you don’t need too many suggestions from too many people because you know about your why. So it defines your decisions that you have to make and define process, it’s defines your happiness. You don’t need constant guidance.
Being an outsider can you tell what difficulties you faced in your initial days?
There are two things- number one, when you start your career, before you need one person completely believe in you and that person has to be you. but when you are starting your career you need somebody who completely has faith in you and that one person should be apart from you to put in the kind of money which is required for making the film and more than that the filmmaker trust in you. You need that guy. Otherwise you won’t make the break. The only difference I can see, actually two differences, number one is insiders already have or when they are preparing may be, they know that they will get a break. Outsiders don’t know how it will happen. They can believe that one day that will happen and it’s a very good thing but how it will happen. The pendulum swings everyday. It will happen one year from now or two years from now. It sounds very simple that insider already knows that he will get a break and outsider is not sure. If you give an outsider extra belief that one day he will make it, it makes the big difference. The other major difference between insider and outsider, which mostly happens, I’m not saying that every time it happens but mostly it happens that if an insider does a good job, it is projected as a very good job. If he fails in delivering a project, it is actually sedated. But if an outsider does a very good job, people will say ok, it was a good job. If he fails, there you fail (Laughs). But in a long run it doesn’t matter. It’s equal for both in long run.
Do these things make you more careful?
I don’t think about future so much. What I do is one day I will sit, I’ll see, I’ll reflect and I will think about things that I want to do in next five years. I’ll make my goals. I write flow chart that I use to do when we were doing engineering. You know the kind of things has happened in last ten-twelve years in my life, I dreamt small dreams and I made them true. When I dream big dreams the success rate is hundred percent. So what has happened is now when I write down my dreams, I already believe that it will happen one day. I’m scared that whether the kind of dream I’m dreaming is right for me or not because this will happen what I am writing now. I write it and then I fold that paper and keep it in drawer and I don’t see it again. Because that will happen five years from now and that will happen one year from now. Then I don’t think about it. I don’t sit and pack my back again and again saying that your success is hundred percent. Or one day I will be very happy after one year that this I wanted to do. So past is fine, future is fine. Most important thing is right now whether I’m talking to you whether I’m thinking about tomorrow or day after or film I’m suppose to do in next on year or I’m excited about things we are talking right now. At this point of time this is more important. That’s why this is happening, otherwise this wont have happen.
One most important thing I think there is one major problem because I was very good student in my school and college. I wanted to be the best. One thing I have realized that there is and it’s not only in Indian schools, it’s almost everywhere. There is one major problem and that’s why we are conditioned like we are scared most of the times. We should learn not to be careful. This is bottom line which is worked for me. This one mantra has worked for me. I’m not saying cross the road with your eyes close but what I mean is we are too careful too many times. We should learn how to be not careful. I don’t think about future, because I don’t live there because I realized there was a phase in my life between four-five years back when I was constantly thinking about where I come from and where I’m heading. There was a vacuum and I was not living here at present. I didn’t know how one or two year happened in between and I wish I can get those years and I have that regret only. Everything I was working for happened in that phase. But I lost those two years man! So I don’t want to that happen again. So there is fine balance now. what I’m doing right now also for my immediate future, for my film also for my long goal also im working for. I have a kind of check list. What I have done is these are the things I want, so I need to do these four things and I have to make sure, I tick on it every of the four things. And then I can actually be here and I’m trained also. I enjoy doing it so I will do it. So now I have started living. I have started breathing and smiling.
Do you like to meet new people or you like to live in your close circle?
I like to but then the kind of person I am. It’s not like I’m completely introvert. I would rather sit down and listen and observe then I will express and talk. I am very introvert in that sense. I would not go to a get together or a party and walk to a stranger, do small talks or I will be that confident that lets talk. I will never do that. I will stand in a corner.
Is it because you are an actor or star?
No, it is because the reason why I am an actor is this because all my life I was so shy and so introvert and there was a reason for it. I was the youngest sibling. I had four sisters and I was so protected in my house that when I use to go to school, I didn’t know how to deal with people because I was so protected at my place and then suddenly you know that you are being judged. So I thought lets not get into social skills. Let’s get into academic and lets work here. I was trained like that. So I would never go to on a stage for some reason I use to dance at marriages and birthday parties and I don’t know why. But that was it. No talking and no debating. So the first time I was doing theatre in my life when I was in my college when I realized how powerful this communication could be when I’m speaking my dialogues I see stranger getting affected by it. So aise to I didn’t want to speak and first time when I’m actually saying lines and speaking them, I can see people paying for it, coming and I can make them laugh and cry, this was very liberating feeling after eighteen years of living life like that suddenly in front of five hundred strangers. But somehow I knew that this is not me. So I thought that my other ME also change but never did. So I devised a way, I don’t know what part of my brain works when I act and dance, I cannot not be like him. So when you put me on stage in a play or in a dance performance I’m completely different and normally I still can not talk, I cannot communicate if I’m not comfortable with the people. There is my friend and if we are talking about something impressed me then I will talk.
Who are the people around you, with whom you are completely open about everything?
Very few people and I can count on my fingers. Ankita is one of them. One very close friend since last ten years is Mahesh Shetty. It’s not that I’m close to people, it’s just that the kind of things I talk people don’t want to talk about them, they find it boring. And what they want to say is very boring for me and very superficial for me. So it’s very rarely that we have similar point of interest. Like me and Shekhar Kapur use to sit for hours and discuss things. So he is a very good friend. We can discuss about anything for hours and that will not be a just like a casual thing on anything.
What are the common interest between you and Shekhar Kapur?
If I just take out one idea from you, your prospective will change. We are so conditioned from so many years society, as individuals that there are certain right things and there are certain wrong things. If I take out that one idea from you, then there is nothing right or nothing wrong. All the laws that is need to be followed, all the definition of morality that is there is been invented over the years just to create that balance in the society but now we feel that these are right things to do but I’m not saying everything is wrong but every wrong thing is right. I’m just saying do we ever sit and slightly dig into it. Then there is such a big room to debate and talk about anything. Or we just discuss why we do, what we do. But people never do that. Don’t even sit down and talk to them selves that these are the few things I did today. Why did I do it? So it will explain a lot of things to our selves and about other peoples. But we just want to believe, what we want to believe about ourselves and about others. So suddenly there are lot of things to discuss and normally is like I don’t know what to say.
At such a young age, why you are so philosophical and serious about life and even about films also?
Because I have seen a lot in my life and so when you have that because I have seen range. So I think then you are more literal than surreal. When I was growing up, we were five of us and two parents like seven in the family. Then financial issues were there but at the same time I was a brilliant student. So there was the other peak. Then when I went to Delhi there was this prejudice against where you come from. So I had to fight that. Oh he comes from Bihar! So although it didn’t matter but I could sense that people will always find a reason to drag you down and if they a strong reason which this is, I’m like we crib about Britishers that they ruled us and they discriminated us but I will tell you that we are the biggest hypocrites in the whole world and the kind of discrimination goes here because there is a thing against north-east people then we say south Indian people are something else and from Bihar-UP is something else. So we discriminate a lot. It’s not there, it’s me. So I had to fight that when I went to Delhi. Then I did again very well in all my engineering entrance exam. So then there was again a peak. There was a time when I use to give tuitions when I was still studding. So I was setting for engineering exam after my twelth board and I use to give tuition to eleven grade people just to get that extra money. Then I went to one of the best colleges of India. And we were taught that I can only be an engineer or doctor and then may be a graduate IAS officer. There was no fourth other profession but when I went to Delhi I realized this is not the right way to do. You should do what you really enjoy what you do. Everything that our parents in a very good way tell us that you wont be secure, you wont get money, everything I can get from just following or having the courage to follow what you do and then hard work is not a hard work. Then you want to do it. You don’t want to go out. Then you just want to do that. And when you put in so much effort in to something with that kind of dedication because of excitement then there is no point that and then we just add a bit of belief in it, we can sail in any of the career. Suddenly I dropped out from my engineering college and then I came to Mumbai and I was doing theatres and living with six other guys in one room kitchen in Versova. Suddenly I was from a point where I was given scholarship, they were offering me scholarship of Stanford university to suddenly again living with six guys in a single room kitchen doing theatre, learning marshal art and dance. Then loosing my mother at a very early age back in 2002 when I was around 18 years. So I have seen it all. I waited on a road in rainy day to stop an auto, they were not stopping, I was drenched and I was thinking have I made the right decision? And I don’t regret anything, any decision. I love my penthouse, range rover but at the same time I love those days when I lived with six guys eating khichdi everyday, getting up 4.30 in the morning for marshal arts and waiting for the auto to come. So each and every moment of those days are as much important as dear to me as these moments when I am a star. When I say I really mean it. So yes, I have got a range of experience. I have seen people changing in front of me. I have trusted wrong people. I have lost few very dear ones. Sometimes I was reason for it. So I have seen everything. And I don’t take myself very seriously. So when you don’t take yourself very seriously but you have to take your work seriously because you love it, not because you are suppose to because you love it. But you should not take yourself very seriously and all these things give me extra amount of courage and I was slightly bit fearless and more I like to think about stuff because I like thinking. So I don’t get confuse. I know exactly what my priorities in this industry. So I won’t be swear by what others are doing because that must be correct for them but this is what is correct for me. Because I get high doing all these things what I do. So I will not change. Why should I change?
When do you miss your mother most?
We can’t describe it. There is one thing I have lost and I can not ever… I can do anything and everything but there is sense of loss. It’s an incomplete achievement. The only thing that has helped me is that since I don’t attach myself so long to the goal itself. When it happens it’s not a very big thing for me. Normally when do you miss your very dear ones? Is that when you are like very happy in your life and when you are very sad in your life. Then you actually think that it would have been better if that close one was with you. so what has happened over last ten years is somehow I divide this way of living that there are no strong fluctuation. So if I get anything if I really want, I will not be very happy or very excited like I don’t know what to do. Or if something goes wrong I won’t be very sad. So it’s like very neutral space. So there is never a very strong urge of missing my mother, at the same time there can be never a point where I don’t miss her.
With whom you are very close into your family?
I’m close to everyone. I’m not close to anyone. Because of the loss I think this the slight change that has happened because I was very close to my mother and mother was very close to me. And till that age I never thought there will be a day when she won’t be around. You never think. How many times we sit down and we think that one day we will die. Never! So I never thought I will loose her one day. Suddenly it happened and she was not ill or something. She got a brain hemorrhage one of the days and gone. I was so emotionally unconditionally attached to her and I remember I didn’t cry for six-seven days because I didn’t know what was happening and how can this happen. But something changed inside. So there is strong feeling that I can sense that I don’t want people emotionally get attach to me. It’s a kind of survival technique. I don’t do it consciously but now it has changed. So there are people who are close to me and there are people I really don’t care about but nobody is like extremely close to me the way my mother was.
Do you agree that an actor and a cricketer go with same kind of high and low in life?
Yes because they are brave guys. The moment you connect yourself with constant public surveillance and feedback, highs and lows are for everybody because we can see it, we can talk about it but it is on you at the end of the day to live the life you want to. If and I have done it many times if I don’t watch girls gossip channels, don’t read newspapers, not on my phone for most of the times, I hardly know because I hardly meet fifteen or twenty people in a day and they have good things to say. So I don’t know what’s happening around. So it’s totally depend on you how you want to screw your life. That’s about it. You can be a cricketer and do the same thing. But yes you constantly, why I told you this because we are constantly finding way to put them in a situation where they can be like heavily scrutenist. It’s difficult thing to do.
Why you are so selective? Don’t you want to be seen more and earn more money?
I have that much money that I don’t have to think about it. So I will be very honest to you, if you find a way to take out a million from my bank account I won’t get to know or even if you put a million, I wouldn’t get to know. So it’s a good state to be in that you have that much money that you don’t have to think about it. So I will never work for money, although yes money, fame, everything that my career gives me I love them. But I love acting a bit more.
Are you an investment savvy? How much do think about financial security?
No. Every kind of security is important if you give them that place in your life. I told you that’s the only thing we are looking for. I will give you an example. Everybody was talking to me for making transition from TV to films. I was so much sure at one point of time, may be they are right. I was like I can’t live my whole life like this. So let’s make a deal with yourself. Like how much money do you want every month? So it was a simple modest figure of say 75 thousand per month as like then. So if I give you that much money that you can fix deposit and you can get interest on that of 75 thousand. Then I work back words and found out that if you make an investment of say one crore rupee you will get 75 thousand interest every month. So I made a deal with myself like done. I will give you a crore, fix deposit it and then just quit. So I did that.
Have your any relationship went sour because of saying no to a film?
Every time you make a decision you are going rub people few people wrong way and you will make certain people happy but I have realized that because I was very scared that I will lose out some friend but I have realized that once you get along these things don’t matter. So we are still friends. We are still thinking of doing a film together. These one or two decisions won’t make or break our relationship. And if it does then its good. you get to know people.
Mukesh Chhabra, Sushant Singh Rajput and Raghuvendra Singh at PVR Juhu
Do you believe in the race of number one?
See things change when I don’t want to say that I’m blind and cant see the things happening in the industry. If somebody else make a say what they call hundred crore film or back to back hits, they will be the first choice for the film you want to do. So there I’m actually in the race because I want to do good films. So if somebody’s doing three-four films a year and they are fortunate enough to have hits back to back and I mean it. So then what happens is I will not be the first choice of the good filmmakers and the good films. So yes, I’m kind of in a race. But everyday there is pendulum swinging. I want to be and I’m sure at one point in a day that I will be one of the best actors and one of the biggest stars and the other day on the other point on the same day I don’t want to do it. I don’t want to be that guy. I just want to have a good time and then may be get into something that I’m more excited about. So I’m very detached person, at the same time I want to be number one.
You don’t fear expressing yourself on social platforms. Don’t you fear being trolled?
There’s no way that you won’t be trolled unless when asked for an opinion, you don’t give it. It’s a tricky state that we’re in. If you don’t have an opinion you’re looked down upon and if you have an opinion then those who disagree with it, will troll you. The platform provides that you can work as a group and bring somebody down. When you are up, they will bring you down. It’s fun for them. It’s like, ‘Oh look at that guy, he’s rich, he’s famous, he has everything I don’t have. And now look at him shaking in his pants and just feeling like us mortals’! They feel good about it. It’s the same thing with fame. They will take you up; they will bring you down, just to have fun in their lives. It has nothing to do with you. So you can’t take yourself or your fame seriously. In today’s times, being popular doesn’t mean that you’re good. You can be stupidest of all, you can be the most irritating, foolish and dumb guy in the world. But if you have the persistence of being a fool or sounding dumb again and again, you will be famous. And people will follow you on these platforms, no matter how dumb stupid are.
What kind of a girl would be ideal for you?
(Smiles) I wish I had that power to describe that and have her immediately appear! Probably, somebody who’s not very much affected by success and failure, money and fame. She should be able to view things with a sense of humour. Generally, people invest a lot of energy in ‘let’s do something interesting’. But she should be someone who’s okay not doing anything, just being with me. Also, it could be about things she likes, which I may not like, yet I genuinely listen to her talk about them. That shows a kind of relationship. So it would be not changing the other person into what you want her to be. Rather take it as she is.
