Naseeruddin Shah admits overconfidence killed his growth as an actor compared to Om Puri | Hindi Movie News – Times of India

Veteran actor Naseeruddin Shah recently opened up about his journey in the Hindi film industry. He admitted that he had become overconfident regarding his craft during the early days in his career, which subsequently killed his growth as an actor.
Speaking to a news portal, Naseeruddin said that he was 20 years old when he was in the National School of Drama. He was overconfident and thought that he was the cat’s whiskers at that time. He had this attitude that why was he not being cast as Hamlet as he can do it better. This attitude disappeared gradually before he entered the film industry.
During his time in NSD, Naseeruddin met his close friend and late veteran actor Om Puri. He found him to be ‘very raw, nervous, shy, introverted and an insecure person opposite to how he was. He was the hero of the stage in Aligarh university and he came to NSD with a swagger. But by the time they both were finishing NSD, Naseeruddin realised how much Om had grown in 3 years.

It was very disturbing thought for Naseeruddin as he felt that he was still there where he was when he came to NSD. He had questioned himself, ‘I could act like this when I came here, so what have I learnt? What am I going to do now? Where am I going to earn my bread?’
Post NSD, Om stayed in Delhi while Naseeruddin shifted to the film institute. He then started getting work in movies. After that phase, he said that he never felt he can easily crack any project that he did.