Up until just five years back, Aditya Roy Kapur must have been the only mainstream Bollywood actor who was content with being on the sidelines. He couldn’t imagine himself as a Hindi film hero because he didn’t see himself fit the prototype. Kapur hails from a family with veritable film connections — his grandfather was a film producer, one brother, Siddharth is MD of Disney-UTV and the other, Kunaal is an actor — yet he isn’t the typical filmy kid.
“I haven’t grown up on a staple diet of Hindi films,” says Kapur. “I didn’t idolise anyone from here. I was into Bruce Lee, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Arnold Schwarzenegger,” he continues in a chat at a studio in Bandra before the release of his latest film Fitoor . In this Indian adaptation of Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, he plays a Kashmiri artist tormented by unrequited love.
It’s been quite a leap for Kapur: from a likable but ultimately inconsequential presence in multi-starrers ( London Dreams , Action Replay and Guzaarish) to leading man in content-driven mainstream Hindi movies helmed by respected directors — Habib Faisal ( Daawat-E-Ishq ) and Abhishek Kapoor ( Fitoor ).
“I’d think that I will do different and edgy stuff, but then I ended up contradicting myself. It’s been a journey of self-discovery,” he says, “Doing potboilers such as Action Replay actually liberated me from all the pre-conceived notions I had about good and bad cinema because of the freedom and craziness it gave me. I signed my first film, London Dreams quite casually, thinking I should not let go of the chance to go to London and maybe give acting a shot.”
The unexpected success of Aashiqui 2 (2013) launched him into the big league of Hindi cinema’s young, new leading men. Aditya played a broken, tragic alcoholic singer opposite Shraddha Kapoor. Powered by their freshness and a superhit soundtrack, the film was a box office success. Kapur hasn’t quite made his mark as an * actor * yet. But his good looks, that come from his half-Punjabi and half-Indian Jewish origin, coupled with a Bandra-bred upmarket charm has made him a bankable alternative for big studios such as Yash Raj Films, UTV and Dharma Productions. While he was brought in as a replacement to Sushant Singh Rajput for Fitoo r , his next by Karan Johar’s production house is the Hindi remake of Mani Ratnam’s OK Kanmani . Once without any ambitions of becoming an actor, Kapur finds the heady feeling of being a movie-star alluring. “ Aashiqui 2 gave me the confidence that I could carry a film on my shoulders. Also, the scene has changed. There are so many young filmmakers with varied roles to offer. I love it now. Its all play, not a job,” he says.
Litmus test
Fitoor will be a litmus test for Kapur, whose previous film, Daawat-e-Ishq (2014), was a flop. But he is fairly self-critical, even cringing at some of his own work. He is aware of his shortcomings — his faulty diction and his difficult-to-shed urban body language. “Before the shooting, Abhishek Kapoor was worried that I’m so animated and talk so fast that I may not be able to play the character of a lower middle class Kashmiri as well. But that’s the joy of being an actor. You get to play characters from different places who’ve led such different lives,” he says.
If the shots of him as an artist at work in Fitoor promos show us more of his well-toned biceps and torso, Kapur assures it is not an artistic compromise but a wee bit of “cinematic liberty”. “He is not just a painter, he’s an installation artist as well,” says the actor. “He does a lot of hard labour with metal and wood, and he has small, frugal meals. Gattu (director) asked for a lean body. But I thought, if I’m showing myself shirtless, I might as well look good and feel good about myself.”
It’s been quite a leap for Kapur: from a likable but ultimately inconsequential presence in multi-starrers to leading man in mainstream Hindi movies
