Pratik Gandhi, who has turn out to be the toast of the city submit his nuanced portrayal of the notorious stockbroker, Harshad Mehta, within the net collection Rip-off 1992 – The Harshad Mehta Story, is a famend Gujarati actor who has been honing his abilities on the stage for the previous 15 years. The actor talks about how life has modified submit the discharge of the Hansal Mehta directorial, and divulges why he calls theatre an actor’s gymnasium.
How does it really feel to style this type of successful, particularly after having such a illustrious profession in theatre?
My daughter had the perfect response! She requested me ‘Papa, why are instantly so many individuals calling you up and congratulating you?’ So, I instructed her that I’ve labored on this net collection and individuals are loving my efficiency. To this, her response was: ‘However why now? You could have completed so many performs… did they not watch you then?’.
Sure, it’s a bit unusual. Folks I might method earlier than and get promptly turned down by are actually calling me as much as congratulate, to work with me, to take interviews. I’m not bitter, it’s worthwhile to write your personal success story, and typically it takes time OTT platforms are a mainstream medium and its attain is huge. With the web-series, I’m now reaching all people’s house, I’m on each cell. Therefore, individuals are attending to find out about me now. However it’s nonetheless very overwhelming, to say the least!
How troublesome was it to play such a controversial character, particularly since he’s nonetheless a lot vivid in public reminiscence?
It is rather attention-grabbing for actors to method such characters as there are numerous issues out there within the public area for reference. However I’ve noticed that always whereas enjoying a public determine, we focus a lot on the persona that the human aspect of such characters are sometimes largely ignored. There are two sides to the Harshad Mehta story, one is how he ruined the financial system and led so many individuals to commit suicide, and the opposite is that of an bold man. I learn up all the pieces I may lay my fingers on. After which I unlearned all the data. I knew I needed to method him from a impartial, unbiased area, the place he’s neither the villain nor the hero.
However how did you handle to get into that goal area, can one be utterly unbiased whereas enjoying such a personality?
That’s the place my years of theatre expertise got here helpful! I’ve performed numerous real-life characters (together with Gandhi in Mohan No Masalo which additionally earned him a Limca Guide of Data point out) on stage and what I’ve all the time tried is to the touch the feelings and the human points of the characters. As an alternative of performing just like the character, I attempt to react like them. I don’t need to make any grand assertion via them as an actor. I feel it’s extra essential and positively extra attention-grabbing to maintain it open to the viewers’s interpretation.
There have been numerous locations on this net collection the place it was straightforward for the actor to get a bit carried away and play to the gallery. ‘Hero’ ban jana bohot pure intuition hota hai for an actor…particularly the form of strains I had on this, they have been quite filmy, and as an actor you might be tempted to pitch it as a punch. My whole purpose was to make all the pieces lifelike. As an alternative of projecting the strains as a hero, it needed to sound like an individual who talks like that in common conditions, that’s their means of speaking, it isn’t dialoguebazzi.
