When Abhishek Banerjee played the role of ‘Jana’ in Shraddha Kapoor and Rajkummar Rao starrer Stree, he left the audience impressed. While the second movie in the Stree franchise is currently running in theatres and ruling the box office, in an exclusive interview with News18 Showsha, Banerjee recalled what happened when the first Stree movie released in 2018. Although the actor admitted that Jana was his ‘big break’, he also revealed that he was stereotyped as a comedy actor after the film, triggering a depressive episode.
“After Jana, I was getting all these goofy characters. Everybody wanted me to wear some rangeela, chamkeela kapda and speak in a certain way. Jana was just a character and while I’m close to it, that’s not who I am in real life. Then I did Dream Girl and Bala and everyone thought I was a comic actor,” Banerjee told us.
“I was depressed during Covid. I thought, ‘Shit, nobody is going to imagine anything more for me.’ Thankfully Sudeep Sharma imagined me as Hathoda Tyagi in Paatal Lok. He imagined that by watching Stree, so full marks to him,” the actor said.
Abhishek shared that while Jana was his ‘big break’, it was his Pataal Lok character Hathoda Tyagi that ‘sealed the deal’. “After Hathoda Tyagi, I got calls from the industry saying, ‘Oh tu toh actor hai. Tu toh yeh kar sakta hai.’ But again, after Hathoda Tyagi I started getting psycho characters. Now the fight is to prove that I can play normal characters. I can do drama, romance, anything. I am very stubborn,” he said.
However, the 39-year-old actor also agreed that he is not alien to criticism and was therefore questioned by many after the success of Pataal Lok. “Someone said, ‘Paatal Lok main Abhishek ne aisa kya kiya hai? Voh toh Jana jaisa hi hai. Yeh toh asaan hai.’ I also thought that it was easy. I just had to get into that mental space. I told my ADs not to talk to me for the first two days. I tried all of that but I’m not that guy. I like to have fun on set even as Hathoda Tyagi. From the third day, I left all of that and had fun on set. Later I heard, ‘Aisa kya kar diya? Abhishek toh ek hi cheez karta hai’,” Abhishek revealed.
The actor further shared that it is hard to convince filmmakers that he can play varied roles. “When I did ‘Stolen’, Anurag Kashyap called and said, ‘Yaar maine kabhi imagine nahi kiya tha ki tu ek rich Dilli wala lag sakta hai’. This is coming from one of the best minds out there. It’s very cliched here. Now everyone calls me versatile but it’s because I wanted to prove to people that I can do it,” he said.
“That’s why we have Irrfan Khan – jinko 15-20 saal lag gaye the. Main nahi chahta mujhe itna time lage. I want it to be quicker. I’ll tell you a secret. I love myself on screen. Mujhe main bohot pasand hoon. Like Kareena Kapoor said, ‘Main apni favourite hoon.’ I’m also the same. My friends tell me, ‘We don’t enjoy praising you because you keep praising yourself.’ I have been like this since my theatre days in college. I would perform and think, ‘Waah, kya kiya hai maine!’ I have always been in love with myself more as an actor than as a person. In my personal life, I started loving myself very recently. But as an actor, I have always loved myself,” the actor concluded.
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