I was really surprised that you could get admission in college on the basis of your acting skills-Abhishek Banerjee
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Posted by Fenil Seta
Niharika Lal (BOMBAY TIMES; July 16, 2022)
Abhishek Banerjee’s role as the hammer-wielding gangster Hathoda Tyagi (in Paatal Lok) made him a household name. An alumnus of KMC (Kirori Mal College), Delhi, Abhishek says he took admission in that college because it was Amitabh Bachchan’s college. In Delhi for a project, he talks to us about his college days and how it took him almost a decade to crack the code as an actor, while he worked behind the scenes as a casting director and also did small roles. Excerpts from our chat with him:
‘I DIDN’T KNOW ONE COULD GET ADMISSION IN DU WITH ACTING SKILLS’
The Delhi boy shares, “Even when I was in school (Kendriya Vidyalaya in Delhi), I wanted to get into KMC because I was a huge fan of Mr Bachchan and he was an alumnus of KMC. Main yeh sochta tha ki main thoda ghoos (bribe) khila ke kaam chala lunga. Then I met Mohd Zeeshan Ayyub; he was from my school and studied in Kirori Mal College. He told me that I could also get admission by appearing for the theatre auditions (under ECA quota). I was really surprised that you could get admission in college on the basis of your acting skills, and that’s how I got into KMC and then Players (the theatre society of KMC).”
Talking about Players, he adds, “It is one of the best theatre groups in the country, and I’m not talking about amateur theatre groups. It is the best professional theatre group in the country. We have many talented people working in the film industry from Players – from Ali Abbas Zafar to Divyenndu (Sharma) and Zeeshan (Ayyub). And of course, we have veterans like Satish Kaushik and Kulbhushan Kharbanda.”
‘AS A CASTING DIRECTOR, I COULD NEVER BE PARTIAL, EVEN TO FRIENDS’
Abhishek’s first brush with films was on the sets of Rang De Basanti (2006). He played a small role in the film. He says, “It was the first time when I went on a film set, and I realized that there are so many other things to do on a film set apart from acting. But I wanted to become an actor.”
Apart from Rang De Basanti, where he played the role of a DU student, the actor also had a small role in Bombay Talkies (2013) and played a pickpocket in No One Killed Jessica (2011). Abhishek had auditioned for the role of Manish in the film but was rejected. The role was eventually bagged by Zeeshan Ayyub.
Abhishek shares that while he did not go to FTII (Film and Television Institute of India) or NSD (National School of Drama), he learned from his experiences on film sets, where he started working as a casting director. He has 90 credits on IMDB as a casting director, which includes films like Secret Superstar and Toilet: Ek Prem Katha. He says that over the years, there have been many times when his fellow casting directors would reject him for roles.
He says, “In Ghanchakkar, I thought I could have been cast as I knew the team, but I was not. It was a learning from my seniors, and that is why I could never be partial as a casting director, even to friends.”
While he kept doing small roles and got a lot of offers for playing the hero’s friend, Abhishek says he didn’t want that. He adds, “In 2018 when I was offered the role of Rajkummar Rao’s friend in Stree, I was not convinced. But Amar sir (Amar Kaushik, director of Stree) told me that it is a film with three guys. While it was an important role, I think the role after which people started noticing me was Hathoda Tyagi. And then they would recall Stree and Phillauri and so on.”
Talking about his experiences and learnings as a casting director, he tells us, “I have been casting from the time when we were known as casting coordinators and not casting directors. We know a lot of good actors who haven’t got space. We try to not waste them on small roles – and when the time and the role and the director are right, we cast them. And then people wonder yeh kahan se aaye? Yeh yahin thay – yahin theatre kar rahe thay.”
This entry was posted on October 4, 2009 at 12:14 pm, and is filed under
Abhishek Banerjee,
Abhishek Banerjee interview,
Amar Kaushik,
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Kirori Mal College,
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Paatal Lok,
Rang De Basanti,
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