Man of the moment
Sushant Singh Rajput is working with the top banners in the industry and making a mark in Bollywood, says Chitra Anand Papnai
It's a treacherous journey from the small screen to the big bad world of movies. But Sushant Singh Rajput, who was once a household name playing Manav Deshmukh on Ekta Kapoor's serial Pavitra Rishta on Zee TV, has had a dream debut on the rough and tough silver screen.
His debut film Kai Po Che!, based on Chetan Bhagat's The 3 Mistakes of My Life, was a rip-roaring hit and his latest Yash Raj release Shuddh Desi Romance did close to Rs 7 crore business on the first day itself and about Rs 46 crore till mid-October. "Right now it's the most exciting phase in my career because I'm getting the opportunity to work with filmmakers who know why they are telling a particular story and strongly believe in it," says Rajput ebulliently.
Success begets success in the movie world and it goes without saying that the offers are pouring and Rajput is now highly sought after by the industry's top directors. He has already signed up for movies like Shekhar Kapur's Paani, Dibakar Banerjee's Byomkesh Bakshi and Rajkumar Hirani's Peekay " for which he has finished shooting his part.
"Among the young stars on the block you can say Rajput is leading the pack with his talent, marketability and the fact that big directors want to cast him in their films," says film critic Sai Ramachandran.
Adds movie industry expert, Komal Nahta: "Rajput is being called the next big thing because he is a very fine and natural actor who performs with such ease that you forget that he is acting. And once an actor does a Yash Raj film, the industry starts looking at him seriously because Aditya Chopra is known to spot great talent."
Inevitably, the young actor has already been labelled the Next Big Star but Rajput is not taking this tag too seriously and is instead taking each day as it comes and focusing on shooting. "As much as I want to take credit for the success of my films, I can't, because as an actor you can give your 100 per cent but nine out of 10 things are not in your hands. I think I have been fortunate that rest of the things worked out fine," he says with becoming modesty.
But the world is moving rapidly for him. He has done his bit for Rajkumar Hirani's Peekay alongside Aamir Khan and Anushka Sharma and next month he will start shooting for Dibakar Banerjee's Byomkesh Bakshi. Rajput reckons that this one month before shooting begins is crucial for the movie. "I think the preparation which goes into perfecting the character before the shoot is the trickier phase than actually shooting for it," says the actor, who has already spent weeks in Calcutta researching and figuring out how to play the fictional detective.
"To play Byomkesh Bakshi you have to go back to the past and work on the body language and many other aspects because the movie depicts the Calcutta of 1940s," reasons Rajput.
The actor met his ladylove Ankita Lokhande on the sets of teleserial Pavitra Rishta; (top) the 14th International Indian Film Academy awards held in Macau this year saw Rajput flaunt his dancing skills
Soon after he finishes with Byomkesh..., Rajput will head to the sets of Shekhar Kapoor's Paani which is scheduled to start shooting next year, Paani is a dark story about the water crisis that is likely to overtake India and the world in coming years.
Sitting in a small glass cabin in Yash Raj Studios, the actor takes occasional sips of coffee and looks remarkably casual as he talks about his journey into the limelight. Rajput is keenly aware of the newly found fame and adulation but says that hasn't touched his life very much yet. He says acting was always a passion and he never really made a conscious decision to enter TV or Bollywood.
He started by testing out his feet on the dance-floor and that snowballed into a passion in which he was determined to excel. Once Rajput had become a master of the dance-floor he began to think about the nitty-gritty of acting.
Today the critics have labelled him a great actor who emotes well on the big screen but the actor says he's still extremely shy and finds it tough to express himself when talking to strangers. And making a move into dance and theatre were almost an escape from his painful shyness. "Performing in front of complete strangers and observing that they were getting influenced by your performance felt very powerful and liberating," he says.
Initially, the actor's life looked like it was heading in a different direction. He has four doting and academically gifted elder sisters and his father was an engineer, so Rajput was expected to follow in the paternal footsteps. The actor was also a strong performer in the world of academics and cleared his engineering exams with ease. He joined the prestigious Delhi College of Engineering but quit in the sixth semester.
For starters, he headed to the quick-stepping world of dance and was picked for Shiamak Davar's dance company. "I skipped my sixth semester exams to be a part of the dance troupe which performed at the Commonwealth Games in Australia," chuckles Rajput. It was his dance guru Davar who recognised the youngster's potential and advised him to sign up for acting classes.
Rajput's next stop was the Barry John's theatre group where he thoroughly enjoyed himself and quickly honed his skills as an actor. "It was the joy of exploring myself and different characters that got me more and more interested in acting," says Rajput. After being bitten by the acting bug, Rajput announced to his family that he was headed to Mumbai to explore the theatre scene there.
"My father was a bit taken aback initially but I convinced him that I was happy doing theatre even if it didn't mean a financially secure future," recalls Rajput.
Rajput's debut film, Kai Po Che!, based on Chetan Bhagat's The 3 Mistakes of My Life, was a huge success
In Mumbai Rajput joined Nadira Babbar's theatre group Ekjute. It was during one of his Ekjute performances that the Balaji Telefilms' casting team spotted him and picked him to play the second lead in Star Plus' Kis Desh Mein Hai Meraa Dil. He quickly made his presence felt on the show and that in turn, led to the role of Manav Deshmukh on Zee TV's Pavitra Rishta in June 2009 opposite Ankita Lokhande. It was on the sets of the show that his romance bloomed with his co-actor Ankita. The two now live together and plan to marry soon. "It could happen this year or next whenever Ankita is ready," says Rajput with a mischievous grin.
But the young actor figured he was still on the first steps of the ladder of his acting career. So, he decided on taking a bold step and quit Pavitra Rishta in 2011 and head to the US to do a filmmaking course. But fate intervened and he was offered the role of Ishaan in Kai Po Che!. It was an offer Rajput couldn't refuse and the rest is history.
Looking back, Rajput unsurprisingly, has no regrets about not going abroad. He figures he's learning on the job from the best in the industry. "Every director teaches you something and on the sets I'm always after the technicians' lives to understand the technical details a scene entails," he says with a grin.
He's playing his winning hand carefully though. While many newcomers are signing two or three movies at the same time, Rajput doesn't believe in juggling two roles and goes strictly by the rule of doing one movie at a time. He says: "I don't think I can play two roles at the same time so whenever I'm working on a film I request my filmmakers to give me two to three month's time so that I can work on the character."
There are many actors who talk about their years of struggle before they made it to the big time. But Rajput has a different take on this phase. "It's not a struggle if you are doing what you love to do," says the star.
But the actor insists that the early struggle is all part of the game and crucial to the ongoing process of understanding and perfecting how to act, play a character and learn about filmmaking. "Everything else is secondary, even money," he says.
Today, Rajput wants to take each day as it comes and make the most of it. His only grouse is that though he's a nocturnal creature and sleeps only four hours a night he isn't getting enough time to himself.
Still he feels the last few years have been happy ones. "In the last three years I'm happily not sleeping much but reading books on cinema, watching movies, and spending time with Ankita," says the actor with glee. "There is so much more to learn and understand," he adds.
In the future Rajput's ambition is to direct films but only once he has learnt and mastered the art of storytelling. He likes to call himself a student of cinema. "I would like to tell my own story in the future but as of now I feel I have nothing to say," he confesses candidly.
Where will he be five years from now? Rajput confesses that he has no clue whatsoever. But he says with great conviction: "Whatever I will be doing, be it acting or something like pottery, I will be enjoying it thoroughly."
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