Content creator and actor Bhuvan Bam is currently basking in the success of his recent OTT outing, Taaza Khabar. While he is grateful for all the love coming his way, Bam says he wants to remain connected to his YouTube family of over 25 million subscribers.

The 29-year-old actor, who was last seen in a rom-com Rafta Rafta, says, “I find ample time to write episodes to keep my channel running. My audience deserves it. I can’t let go of that because they made me. Woh mujhe naturally aata hai and while doing that, I have got bigger ambitions.”

With his OTT debut Dhindora, as well as the show Taaza Khabar, Bam stepped into the shoes of an actor as well as a producer as he “wanted to have creative control”. “It was on my bucket list that I would make my acting debut with my own show and characters. There is a larger goal for which I’m here. My dream is to tell stories, and we are a land of content. I want to tell my own stories in my own capacity. It might take a few months or a few years, but that’s how I want to go about it. That’s why I’m serious about projects we are working on,” he says.

Talking about taking up acting full-fledgedly, Bam elaborates, “Every time I faced the camera for my YouTube videos, I realized acting is what I wanted to do. I remember cracking characters like Titu Mama, and many times, people couldn’t differentiate between the real me and my characters, which made me realize that I could pull this off and that maybe, I was doing something right. I decided to take acting up seriously and polish my already existing skills. I learnt a lot of new things on my way. It was a gradual process. I never thought that I’ll do a full-fledged acting job but it eventually happened and now, I’m glad that I took the risk.”

The growth of the digital space, he feels, is heartening as ever since the pandemic, “people have now started taking OTT seriously”. With many content creators turning actors off late, does he feel he fear that he won’t be taken seriously in the industry?

To this, Bam says, “When you’re trying to change the perception about yourself, the first few projects are tough as people can’t imagine you in any other character other than your existing image. In my case, casting calls started coming in right after Taaza Khabar. People saw potential and how different it was from a YouTube show. And of course, after the show dropped and people watched it, there has been a drastic change in their basic perception of me.”