Exclusive! Vineet Kumar Singh: When my first film flopped and everyone vanished from my life, I finally ‘understood’ Mumbai

In an exclusive no-holds-barred interview with OTTPlay, actor Vineet Kumar Singh says how his struggles helped him with honing his craft, why Mumbai was always synonymous to hard work for him, and why OTT is not a fad and will never be…

Vineet Kumar Singh's popular movies include Gangs of Wasseypur (1 & 2), Mukkabaaz, among others

Will you ever sell all your personal belongings on a whim, pack up and leave to live in a village JUST to work in a movie? Varanasi boy Vineet Kumar Singh took that uncalculated risk so that he could act in the film he had co-written with his sister—Mukkebaaz.

Riding high on the success of his gangster drama ‘Rangbaaz 3’, Singh sat for a candid conversation with his where he spilled his guts out: “I cannot bring in 35-40 crores with my films. I know that,” he tells us when asked about his desire to be a conventional hero in Bollywood. And, also, the dreams of being a hopeless romantic will finally come to fruition, on screen.

Excerpts from our video interview with the actor:

From love and adulation to appreciation and memes... Rangbaaz has received it all. How does it feel to be appreciated for your work?

Bahut achha lag raha hai, really! Kaam pasand kar rahein hain log, bohot pasand arahaan hain logoko. What more does an actor want?

In one of your previous interviews, you had mentioned that you draw inspiration from your real-life experiences. I want to know to prepare for the part of a gangster, what real-life experiences did you imbibe?

(Laughs!)... Real life toh nahin... For an actor, the whole world is a library. Now it depends upon you whether you take a tour of the library and see the books from outside or you flip the pages, read and think about them. So when an actor goes out to play a character, he refers to this library and picks out people from real life that match his on-screen persona and he tries to read them, analyse them and try to understand them.

The actor then tries to understand how and why a person is the way he is. He tries to understand his psyche. All the other help, and our place to start, comes from the script. It also starts with the writer, showrunner, director. I talk to them a lot, I listen to them a lot to understand their thought process behind the creative journey. Say, for example, my character Haroon Shah Ali Baig (in Rangbaaz 3), who is lovingly called Saheb, so I talked about him as well, researched the character on my own and the team had also informed me about it's nuances. Once that information is gathered, I start with my process. This is the way to go about it, aisa nahi hai ki you will become a gangster. Tomorrow, if you end up taking murdering someone on screen, doesn't mean you are going to do it I'm real life... Hain naa? (smiles!)

For Haroon Shah, I tried to read his mind, understand his thoughts and desires, and make sense of what he wants out of life. Understanding his childhood and upbringing that had impacted him, and the circumstances around him was important. It's a combination of things. I watched interviews of gangsters and politicians, and these aspects build the character.

Like Haroon, he liked to read and was a fan of literature. So, in terms of outward appearances, even the basic details come into play. You imbibe into that character.

Now, start se start karenge... We all know you have been a topper student and, initially, acting was not on the cards. So what was that profound moment or chain of events which prompted you to take up acting?

For people looking from outside, they think I have been to a medical school and then took up acting. So, something must have happened that led me to push myself towards acting. But, that's not the case. Actually, I always wanted to be an actor and that is the reason why I went to medical school.

I wanted to go to National School of Drama (NSD) first but that was not happening for me at the time. I told my family a few times ke main hero banna chahta hoon. Par response waisa nahi tha that I would be able to tread on that path. But my younger brother and sister were always supportive of me. But they were way younger; we are talking about an incident that happened 15 years ago.

Also, this thought stuck in my head that if you are going to Mumbai (to become an actor), you have to struggle a lot. During my time, we had no social media and so, I would read all these interviews in newspapers and almost all of them had one factor in common: actors who had come from outside and got work, they fought a hard battle. But, then, I thought to myself ki main sangharsh kaise karunga? Because, agar Papa ne support nahin kiya, toh mere pair teekenge kaise?

Based on my intelligence from when I was younger, I thought that if I become a doctor—as all my family members are well-educated—then I can practice that in the evenings and struggle to become an actor during the day. With that thought, I prepared for the exam and thought that going to NSD would mean I will be away from my father's grip. In the meantime, I had also taken admission in BHU but within three months I got into a medical school and the other plan of graduating college first and then running off to NSD also went kaput.

When I went to medical college, I chose Haridwar as my preferred location because Delhi is closer (laughs!) Main wahaan se bhaag bhaag ke NSD jaata tha. Wahan jaise koi festival ho raha hain ya koi badiya play hain and if a workshop was on, I would participate. I could not do anything beyond that because I was enrolled in a medical school. So this saga continued for a while but I was always looking for ways to make my dream a reality.

Around the same time, my sister called me saying that a reality TV show is launching soon titled Superstars. She asked me to check it out as they were scouting for actors through that show. And when I watched it in my college mess, I realised it was good, and was THE opportunity I was looking for.

So for auditions, I travelled from Haridwar to Mumbai. Then I got selected, won the show. I met Mahesh Manjrekar sir there and got my first film (Pitaah). Aisa laga ki mazaa hi aa gaya. I only thought of flying up above and moving along (in the industry) from there on. But then the film was released and everything went up in flames. People who would otherwise support, had all vanished from my life. Except for a few, everyone else left. If I approached anyone, they were 'not available' for me. That's when I 'understood' Mumbai.

Main din bhar struggle karta tha aur Mahesh sir ke office pahuch jata tha. He would watch me, and that would go on for 12 long years: Gangs of Wasseypur.

So, this was the relationship between going to a medical college and my acting career.

Your struggles as an actor is the kind of stuff that is very rare and inspiring. What encouraged you to wake up every day and do it all over again?

I was clear in my head about one thing: main yahaan khud aaya hoon. This was my decision and anyhow I will figure it out. I was determined to turn my dream into reality. I had made up my mind that I wouldn't leave Mumbai till I get my big break.

I was standing in one place for a long time and the world around me was moving. So that's what happens in an actor's life. Sabke saath hota hai... Everyone in the business breaks, crumbles and then puts himself back together. And slowly, they move ahead in their careers. But in the meantime, if an actor works on himself, he shines bright as well. These emotions that one experiences during his struggling days also end up being his personal library, his memory bank and it comes handy later. Something I am doing now (chuckles!)

Bas yahin zid thi ki mauka milne ke pehle haar nahin maanunga. Had I gotten a chance and couldn't deliver later, I would have upped and left. Because, I would have known I don't belong here.

There are two stages of my career: Gangs of Wasseypur gave me recognition as an actor, and the second one was Mukkabaaz, which booked a spot for me in a place where I, too, have options now.

Since you mentioned Mukkabaaz, the other day, you talked about wanting to be a 'conventional hero in Bollywood' and how, despite the movie doing so well in terms of critical acclaim—with it even getting perfect fives and 4.5 out of 5 ratings—the response has been lukewarm so far, work-wise?

I won't call it the desire to be a conventional hero. For me, who I was in Mukkabaaz qualifies as a conventional hero. I don;t want to be 'conventional' because I won't survive by copying others. How will I survive like that anyway? I want to find myself as an actor. And I believe that just like my thumb print, I am unique in life as well. You are just as unique. If I don't value what I got, then no one else is going to value me. And I not only understand that, but I believe in it too. So, what can I bring out of myself? What can I do that no one else has to offer? I ask myself these questions and I try to bring that out of me. Rest is okay, you get a character to play and you follow it. You approach it in your own way and the director guides you further. But growth is for you to make. So, it's nothing like I want to be a conventional hero.

Like right now, I want to do romantic films because that side of my personality has never really come out. I didn't get any major opportunities to explore that side of me as an actor. And I also want to do action movies. Yes, right now, I am in talks along these lines and I am going to green light such projects and work on them too. I want to do something different and so I am always on the lookout if someone has a wonderful story to tell. I think to myself that mujhe do!

During the lockdown, my sister and I, who writes (we had co-written Mukkabaaz and pitched it together), we have written a script because, yes, I will always look for good scripts but sometimes you just have to jump into the field and start farming on your own. Something will grow.

If you could tell us more about the movie?

(Smiles!) Yeh bahut jald baazi hog jayegi. I have taken into consideration in this film something that you have asked me about, and even I felt it myself, that box office is very important for theatrical releases. Your quality of work is a different thing altogether. But there's a lot of talk around the box office collection. But I have never thought of it that way, especially during Mukkabaaz when I would only thing ki film ban jaaye mere saath. It was a fight I had won after 18 years. But I am happy for the simple fact that people have given me so much love and appreciated my work so much. The film is a hit but the numbers are not so high that we can say 'wow, what a business!' Of course, performance-wise it was wow. Everyone liked that about the movie.

Anyway, that's when I realised that box office numbers are very important. So in this new script that we have written, the box office numbers-bit has been taken care of. As an actor, I want to dedicate myself to the craft and that would happen only when I am in a position where people would say ki Vineet ke saath naa iss budget ki film ban sakti hain.

If you say that we make a movie with Vineet and it will amass 35-40 crores, then it's not going to happen. Mujhe pata hain yeh baat. I know my limitations. I know my value as well. How 50gms of Colgate is for 12.50 rupees and if someone says no it's for 70 rupees, no one is going to buy that. So, I am trying to increase my 50 gms in the movie business in terms of box office, not in terms of as an actor. Mere acting ke liye main garv mehsoos karta hoon.

You have said that OTT has given you the freedom to express yourself as an actor. Now, the OTT boom was Covid-induced, which is brilliant to consume, but do you fear that it's just a phase? I mean, what's the future?

No, no... OTT is 'the' change and it will not go away. In fact, this is just the beginning for OTT. But even that (the start) has been on such a massive scale. OTT is experimenting big time, with different kinds of work now being done. In the future, even the quality of this work will be even better. Polished writers will come to the forefront. The kids who are consuming OTT content now, will eventually grow up to write finer materials for the space. They will bring something new to the table. Because they are consuming world content.

A comman man, who's watching OTT content, is picking things to watch from different languages and all of that somehow stays with him.

When I used to watch movies back in the day, I had to work hard. Gharse jao, deposit karo paisa aur woh cassette gharpe laake dekho. Then repeat the whole cycle for another film. These days, a person will watch a whole movie in that time. And he has so many options to choose from.

So this is just the beginning for OTT and they are getting to experiment a lot. Like this character of Haroon Shah, 30 years of his life is shown in such a short span of time in a show. Aisa kam hota hain.

This guy is a monster to some, and Messiah to the others. So this character has so many shades to his persona. Now all that is hard to find on screen. Badi screen pe pata nahin mujhe kitna intezaar karna padta. Aage bhi jo karne jaa rahaan hoon woh bilkul Saheb se ulta kuch karne ki mood mein hoon (chuckle!)

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