On screen, he’s called ‘energy bomb’ and ‘Ranveer Singh of the Marathi industry’ but there’s another side to Siddharth Jadhav. One that’s vulnerable and introspective. In a chat with us, the actor, who has been shaking up our social media feeds as much with his style as with his new projects, speaks to us about breaking the comedy stereotype, the new phase and the ups and downs in his career. Excerpts:

Throughout his initial years in Marathi cinema, Siddharth created a name for himself among the list of comic actors in the industry. But he gradually branched out into different roles with films like Me Shivajiraje Bhosale Boltoy, Razzakar, Dream Mall etc. Ask him what changed, and he replies, “As a person nothing changed drastically. People identify me as a comic actor, and I too know that comedy is my forte. But that’s not all. I am fortunate that people accepted my serious roles as nicely as they did my comic ones. Credit for this goes to the directors and writers who thought of me for these roles, especially Mahesh Manjrekar sir who was among the first people to recognize and execute a different side of mine on the big screen. He was also someone who told me that I had the talent of making people laugh when I laughed, and cry when I cried. I consider myself fortunate to have worked with people who saw beyond the stereotype that I had come to be associated with.”

Despite his best efforts, many of Siddharth’s hatke films didn’t work at the box office. The actor, who is otherwise full of energy, went through a low phase between 2013 and 2017. “Although I was doing a play, Gela Udat, and a TV show, I was devastated that my films weren’t working. These four years were an extremely low phase for me. I didn’t know what to do and life seemed to have stopped at one point. It was like being stuck on a boat in the middle of the lake. But my brother, Dr Lavesh Jadhav, told me something that I haven’t stopped following till date,” he says.

“Mahesh sir said that we only think that nothing is happening because there’s no work to do. But there’s so much work that you can do work on yourself, meet people, write, develop your skills. That helped me dive from that stuck boat and swim to the shore. In the process, I left the baggage from Siddharth Jadhav 1.0 behind because had I carried that with me, I would’ve drowned. So, to anyone who may be going through such a phase right now, I want to say that stay put and be strong, this too shall pass,” shares Siddharth.

In 2017, things changed for Siddharth with the release of Faster Fene. Then came Simmba, which reunited Siddharth with his Golmaal director Rohit Shetty and had him sharing the screen with Ranveer Singh. “Aditya Sarpotdar, Kshitij Patwardhan, Riteish Deshmukh these people believed in me and gave me an opportunity in Faster Fene. I won’t ever forget that. With Simmba, of course, came wider recognition. These were not things that I had planned. They happened. All I did was to give my best to whatever I did and just enjoyed the moment,” he says.

Siddharth’s tryst with big-budget Hindi films continued with special appearances in Radhe and Sooryavanshi. He will soon be working with Rohit Shetty and Ranveer Singh again in Cirkus, and he has a silent film titled Gandhi Talks set to release next year. “Cirkus is a family entertainer where I play a fun character. On the other hand, Gandhi Talks is a very interesting film by director Kishor Belekar. It’s a silent film, which also features Vijay Sethupathi, Aditi Rao Hydari and Arvind Swamy. The music is by A R Rahman. What else does one need in a film?” asks Siddharth.

While he has learned to ignore trolls on social media today, there was a point when they affected him. Sharing that he is open to criticism of his work, Siddharth adds, “Personal attacks are something I don’t like. People have taken jibes at the way I look and questioned how someone like me can even be called an actor. I would feel bad before, but not anymore. Criticize my work if you find it bad, but avoid personal attacks. That said, I realise that people need an outlet to vent their frustrations and often, public figures are at the receiving end. Yes, there are some people who troll others just for the heck of it. But I’ve learned not to fixate on that. Today, even if someone writes something bad about me on a photo I have posted, I like the comment and move on.”