Siddhant Chaturvedi: When I first read the ‘Gehraiyaan’ script, I came home and told dad, this is my ‘Baazigar’ – Exclusive – Times of India
There have been a lot of conversations around ‘Gehraiyaan’. What sort of reactions have you been getting?
Some people are loving the performances and then there’s people who are finding layers within the story. Some love the characters, some people love my character, and there are also those who completely hate me. Lots of conversations are happening and a lot of viewers are appreciating the performances from the entire cast. Praise for Deepika you can understand, because she’s such a great actress. Naseer sir ke bare mein toh main kuch bol hi nahi sakta. He’s a legend. But for Dhairya, Ananya and I, to be put in the same reviews and conversations as Naseer sir, Rajat sir and Deepika is encouraging. I am very happy about that.
The on-screen camaraderie between you and Rajat Kapoor is one of the highlights of ‘Gehraiyaan’. How was it working with a veteran like him?
My dad is a huge fan of Rajat sir’s work. I remember when I first told my dad about working with Rajat Kapoor he told me, ‘You better up your game!’ Rajat sir is so amazing. The support that you get from your cast members always helps enhance your performance. Same thing happened in ‘Gully Boy’, too. When you’re working with so many manjhe hue kalakar, aapka ka performance apne aap enhance ho jata hai. I always give half the credit for my performance to my co-actors. I always know what I am going to do, but I like to see myself in my co-star’s eyes.
Your character has grey shades. How much of the ambition and desperation to succeed from Zain did you personally identify with? You are in a hugely competitive sphere yourself…
I do identify with some parts of Zain’s personality. In the film, Zain says, ‘Main kisi ameer khandaan se nahi aaya hoon. I have made it on my own’. I do identify with that part of Zain’s story, he comes from nowhere; he works hard and makes his way. But the moral compass is something that’s different, that part I keep pretty close to me and I like to keep that clean. I am ambitious, but I prefer to say that I have many dreams to fulfil, simply because ‘ambition’ can at times have a negative interpretation. I have a lot of expectations from myself, my parents and peers have a lot of expectations, too. These expectations are not in the form of any pressure, but they are those expectations that you have with twinkly eyes. They give me power and motivation. Yes, there is ambition but I like to see myself in the white side of the spectrum. My parents and friends play an important role in keeping me sane and keeping a check on my reality.
You said in our last interview that you are shy and Deepika backed that up saying most actors are introverts. But then you have to put yourself out there on social media for public consumption, day in and out. How does the introvert personality deal with this complexity?
I tend to detach from every film once it’s done, once it’s delivered to the audience. In my head I keep saying to the audience, ‘Abb ye film aapki ho gayi hai’. I am already thinking about my next film, ‘Yudhra’, which is an action film. Even during the release of ‘Gully Boy’, I never expected a lot. I just did my work and moved on. Yes, I am an introvert, but I really love people appreciating my work. That’s the fuel that keeps me going and helps me realise and expand your dreams. I take it in a positive way. I don’t treat the reactions as noise, I really read every comment. I read the good ones and bad ones, too. But they don’t affect me so much. If it’s good then I’m like, I did a good job, but if the reaction is bad then I say to myself, ‘This is still okay because people are at least talking about me. Three years ago, I was nowhere. Even if people are saying bad things about me, it means that I matter’. It tells me that there are expectations and that I need to work harder and choose better. I do not mind all that attention.
Shakun Batra has poked fun at your Instagram stories and posts, which have the ‘MyNotes’ hashtag. The poetry and word play in these posts is both intense and impressive. Are you moonlighting as a poet?
This poetry thing was never planned. It came to me as therapy during my low phase. I was bullied in school, I also liked a girl, but she never responded and then she rejected me and said, ‘No!’. I was also a shy and lonely child. Today, I write these bits and parts posts, but if you go back to my Facebook page from 2008, I used to write proper, long form poetry. Then came my struggle period and the heartbreak after my first relationship didn’t work out. Back when I was in the CA (Chartered Accountancy) we were together for four years and it didn’t work out between us because she wanted something else and I had other ideas from life. I wanted to shift from CA to Hindi cinema. If you’ve read all my posts, you’ll rarely find happy poetry, it’s always got that longing in it. Now, when I am working on characters like Zain, and I have to deal with depth and darkness, I use poetry as a tool to write what I feel.
As much as Shakun would like to make fun of it in front of everyone, I know he really appreciates my poetry. In fact, that was my pitch to him. Shakun was looking for a guy to do this role and I was just 26 or 27 and one film old. I had to be paired opposite Deepika. But my poetry was what convinced Shakun that I was the right guy for the role. As much as he’d like to deny it, the poetry was what proved to him that I understood the depth of the character.
Your character Zain is an anti-hero. In the past we’ve had many big Bollywood actors like Shah Rukh Khan and Amitabh Bachchan play similar roles. Did you at any point draw any references from the past while playing your role in ‘Gehraiyaan’?
Koi achcha nahi hota, koi bura nahi hota, it’s the situation, the choices and actions that makes you who you are. I stuck to Shakun’s approach and vision. But, initially, when I first heard the script, I came back home and I told my dad, this is my ‘Baazigar’. I am a Bollywood fan, I have grown up watching all these films and you can’t take that out of me. I am not apologising for that, but at the same time there’s also a part of me that only concentrates on the craft of filmmaking. After Shakun would get his ‘okay’ take I would do my SRK take, my Mr Bachchan take on it. I even did a Salman Khan take. We were having fun throughout. I got into movies because I watched all those iconic films by these actors. But you have to be conscious about the fact that you can never out-do what these legends have already done. So if you want to win the game, you have to change the game. That’s why I wanted to play Zain in a new and fresh way.
‘Gehraiyaan’ has a lot of on-screen intimacy, so does it ever get hard or awkward to deal with the reactions from your family and friends to all those bold scenes?
I switched on the trailer of the movie on TV for my parents and ran away. Same thing happened with the release of the song ‘Doobey’. I went up to my parents, informed them that the song had just launched at 10, played the song on the TV and ran into my bedroom. I came back to the room after a few minutes and my dad was just sitting there and he said, ‘Waah!’. My parents are cool, they’re mature about it, but I feel shy so I just keep my distance from the conversation. My parents have watched the film and they’ve liked it. But I haven’t had any conversation with them about it, because there are boundaries between you and your parents and I don’t know how to go about that. My dad came into my room and he wanted to talk about my performance and the film, but I just said, ‘Nahi theek hai, koi baat nahi’.
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