The Hindu : New Delhi News : Waiting to deliver his best shot

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Monday, Mar 10, 2008
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New Delhi

Waiting to deliver his best shot

Madhur Tankha

Manoj Bajpai eagerly awaits his upcoming projects

Photo:R.V. Moorthy

Looking ahead: Actor Manoj Bajpai in New Delhi.

New Delhi: Known for playing off-beat roles with panache in Bollywood, Manoj Bajpai feels his best is yet to come and that he takes up every role as a challenge that he must live up to.

The actor, during a visit to the Capital this past week for the Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards, reminisced his childhood days in Belwa, a nondescript village in Bihar. “Incidentally the village falls in West Champaran where Mahatma Gandhi launched his famous movement. Since my childhood days, I was strongly influenced by the Father of the Nation’s philosophy. The experience of growing up in Belwa was simply amazing, it was a dream life. I want to go there and re-live that dream, but I cannot.”

Sharing his experience as a student in Delhi -- Manoj did History honours from Ramjas College in North Campus – the actor says: “Even in my college days, I was actively involved in theatre. Then I came across the famous theatre personality Barry John and he became my guru.”

Manoj appeared in Shekhar Kapoor’s epoch-making film Bandit Queen before getting a dream role in Ram Gopal Varma’s “Satya” that was about the underworld.

The actor says performing the role of Bhiku Mhatre, a gangster who is alternately hot-headed or extremely caring, in “Satya” was not a daunting task. “No doubt, this film from the factory of Ram Gopal Varma was a turning point in my career. In Bollywood any film is judged by its box-office collection and ‘Satya’ was a super-duper hit. It was not that Ram Gopal Varma had discovered me just like that. He had seen my performances in ‘Bandit Queen’ and ‘Tamana’.”

Manoj’s villainous role in Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra’s “Aks” not only won him rave reviews and awards but also the praise of his co-star Amitabh Bachchan for his powerful portrayal of the dark character.

“It was an honour to share the screen with Amitji. He has been in the Hindi film industry for more than 30 years and I learnt so much from him during the film’s shooting. I have always looked up to him. Enacting the role of a baddie who dies and becomes an apparition was not a difficult task for me. I just follow the characterisation,” says Manoj, who showed his ability to get into the skin of characters in films like “Zubeidaa”, “Pinjar” -- for which he won the National Film Award -- and “Veer Zaara.”

Manoj is of the firm opinion that pressure on cosmopolitan cities can greatly be reduced if more job avenues were opened up in towns and rural areas.

“Then people will not flock to the big cities. Unfortunately my comments were misinterpreted and blown out of proportion by a journalist recently. I am proud of my Bihari roots but I also say that there is no bigger Marathi than me. Bihar, Delhi and Mumbai have played a role in my evolution as an actor. I want to keep myself away from classifying people as Marathi, Punjabi and Bihari. I am a Hindustani, think like an Indian and talk like any other responsible citizen of the country.”

Criticising the recent attack on North Indian taxi-drivers in Mumbai, Manoj says only the poor man gets punished for no fault of his. “If tomorrow I am labelled a Bihari then I would not react. I pray to leaders of various political denominations that they should refrain from making comments that make people come to blows. There are people who describe fellow countrymen as North Indians or U.P.ites but I have always steered from classifying people on the basis of their caste, religion or State.”

Manoj is looking forward to his upcoming film “Jugaar” that has been shot in Delhi. “The film’s title means short-cut and Delhiites are good at that. It tells how people’s lives got affected after the sealing drive launched by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi. I am also playing a character whose job gets affected due to the sealing operation. Then I have ‘Money Hai To Honey Hai’ in which I am acting along with Govinda and Celina Jaitley. My best is yet to come.”

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