Guddu Pandit in Mirzapur has been a career-defining role for you. His bloody rivalry with Pankaj Tripathi’s Kaleen bhaiya has now given way to Guddu calling the shots in the show. What has it been like playing him? Flavourful and enriching. I have had fun playing him, and it’s rare for narratives to allow that. I’m thankful to the people who created this entire world and to have a collaborative director like Gurmeet Singh, who I could play along with. Guddu is a cocktail of these whacky people, who are so different from each other. He is an eclectic mix of all of them and reflects their many shades. Guddu started out as this guy who wanted to be a bodybuilder. He was a simple and easy fellow, but then we see how society triggered him. I sat with this character, trying to take as much as possible from the vision of the writer and director. Then I started shaving off the predictability of it all. You and your wife Richa Chadha turned producers with your home production Pushing Buttons. Your debut venture Girls Will Be Girls recently won the grand prize at the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles. What kind of narratives fo you want to back?We have the big North American release of Girls Will Be Girls coming up in September. We don’t want to shy away from trying our hands at all kinds of genres. For instance, we have a musical comedy coming up, as well as Papita, which has a dark Night Crawlerlike vibe. Everyone has ideas, but finances are the real struggle. That is what makes people rely on formulas, and it is refreshing to see them getting broken. That is how we get new stories and fresh faces. We want to champion that. Mediocrity pushes my buttons, we are in a world of narratives that are rich and a country that is a cultural hub. We do take time in churning out stuff, but we have some great cinema waiting to come out, and we hope to share it on the world stage.You recently came on board for Mani Ratnam’s Thug Life, starring Kamal Haasan. Tell us more.I am super excited. There’s life before Mani Ratnam and after Mani Ratnam, and I am very happy to say that I have crossed over. I have shot one schedule, and I hope I can bring something to the master and cinematic institute that is Mani Ratnam. His world is beautiful and I am waiting to see how it pans out. Filmmakers like him and Vishal Bhardwaj are known for their worldview in the way they write and present their stories, and it’s just so motivating and invigorating to share notes with them. There is always a nervousness, but once you get to know these masters, you realise they are humans. I have now become shameless. If I want to try something, I approach them because they are a world of cinema in themselves.
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