Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I am over that phase where any kind of story would bother me, be it personal or professional. I just laugh it off and forget about it.
N.Y. is like second home to me. I love that city. I have lived there for a couple of years and it's always a pleasure to go back there.
I'm more comfortable watching 'Dev D' with my mom than a film that makes a woman an object whose only purpose is to dance provocatively.
I grew a very early distaste for fame and glamour because I saw what the spotlight and attention can do to you as a family, so to speak.
I believe there are two kinds of journalists. One who sells a story by being creative, and one who sells a story by being sensationalist.
Tamil for me is my cousin Esha. I even told her that I was preparing to play a Tamilian and asked her if she could teach me the language.
I am most attracted to characters and stories that I can relate to. The traditional formula of 'larger than life' I never found attractive.
A decade down the line, I don't want to sit back and think that I didn't do anything to stop disasters like the extinction of certain species.
I was termed 'choosy' because when an actor decides to go against the wind and takes on only non-formula films, he is not left with much choice.
The thing about action films is that they are high on drama in terms of action sequences, have songs and other things, but content is secondary.
People don't think of genres anymore. The script is all that matters. And as long as it appeals to my sensibilities as an actor-producer, I'm on.
Beat up 10 guys, win the girl, and yet you are supposed to be a normal human being. I don't mind doing that as a superhero but not as a real person!
I feel my advantage of coming from a film family is - having seen fame up close, having seen the industry so close and how it works, I was not enamored by fame.
The only sense marriage makes is to share property, your children inherit the name and all that... it is all legal reasons to get married and no reason for love.
If I want to do song and dance, I will and I would like to but I don't want to do it in every film. Where is the novelty then? It just takes the fun out of work for me.
After 'Socha Na Tha' flopped, nobody wanted to work with me. I became very bitter and angry. So now when the industry and the audience accept me, I feel more empowered.
I always wanted my work to speak for itself but I realized you have to show people a little bit of yourself and interact with them, especially before your film releases.
The reaction to 'Dev D' success wasn't a balanced one from my end. I ran away! I should have stayed around and seen how I could balance things. But I wasn't capable of that.
I was inherently slightly more bitter or cynical and that kept me from going to the commercial formulaic crowd. Also, I went to an art college and I did my foundation in art.
I realized that I need to protect my films because the director will move on, the producer will move on too, but as an actor I will be considered a flop if things will not work.
If we are not affected by our environment, then we have somewhere become insensitive. It might be good in a way because you might not be affected by anything and be calm always.
I might say 'let's get married' because I am not rigid, I live moment to moment. These are my views and it is person to person, one should not get influenced with what I am saying.
As a kid I wanted to run away from home every time I got a scolding for being naughty but I never did. Knowing now what happens to unprotected kids on the streets I'm glad I didn't.
It would be great to read a script, which is an action script uniquely written so that it doesn't cost an arm or a leg because we are now accustomed to seeing action in the superhero form.
It's not that I don't want to do different films. The non-mainstream stuff that I did started to get successful... But for an industry which runs essentially on money, they do put you in a box.
When you do films after films, you don't let life happen. At least, in my case, I end up relying too much on emotions, which aren't raw enough. Travel helps me to get a renewed approach towards things.
We are always larger than life because we come from this mentality that since we are a very poor nation, we need an escapist cinema to take us out of our miseries. And that's where Bollywood comes from.
It is definitely hard when you're going against the tide. Of course, it is tough. But does that mean you can't do it? No, it depends on your strength, stamina and ability to take so much power against you.
'One by Two' is a film about two people who live in the same city and do certain things that affect each other's lives. Yet, they are strangers. It's difficult to put the film in any particular genre or box.
My cousins and my uncle have been iconic heroes in the industry and I don't think I'm anywhere close to that, but I'm happy that they like my work. They are my elders and it's natural for me to look up to them.
I always pick characters where it's not his muscles or dance skills that help him, because not all of us can look like that. I am more like someone who'd beat up ten guys, not with his muscles, but his strategy.
I did get a reputation for being choosy and not very easy to be approached, and none of that is true. It is not that I am not approachable, it is just that I am trying to find myself and establish who I am as an artist.
It was really good working with Paresh Rawal. I was nervous at first because he is such a big star and I love his performances, but the initial nervousness went away once I got to know him. He is a very simple and hardworking man.
If I look at Dad's earlier work - 'Bandini,' 'Satyakam,' 'Chupke Chupke,' 'Jeevan Mrityu' - and then his later work, I realize that when something works, the industry doesn't want you to do anything else. They just typecast and milk you.
With my social media posts on fairness creams, I felt really strongly that I needed to speak up about it because I think we can take baby steps. Colour and caste is engrained in our culture, but I don't think it should be applauded or packaged and sold.
Lot of people liked me in 'Manorama Six feet Under,' 'Oye Lucky Lucky Oye,' 'Dev D' and 'Shanghai' and the only common thing in all these films is that when we were making them we never thought they would work. The ones that did not work were safe films.
We have 5000-year-old history which is now almost a part of our DNA. How do you break that? America, for example, doesn't have that history behind it. It romanticizes rebellion. We look down upon rebellion. It's an insult. To think out-of-the-box is looked down upon here.