There were many inspiring qualities of customs officer Costao Fernandes that compelled Nawazuddin Siddiqui to come aboard his biopic. But what got him more excited was the way Fernandes laughed. “He laughs a lot, but there’s still something hidden behind his laughter. That was very interesting to explore,” Siddiqui tells us. The Zee5 biopic drama, directed by Sejal Shah, follows a gold smuggling case that Fernandes fought against in the 1990s. Siddiqui was awed by the officer’s courage and moved by his suffering when standing against a corrupt system.

Costao is an addition to his 26-year glorious filmography as an actor. As we remind him of the number of years he has been in the industry, he smiles and says, “The more I am experienced, the more I am scared thinking about acting because there are so many things to be explored. There could be 1,000 ways to perform a scene and the process of finding them is what I feel is interesting.”

Last month, at the Chandigarh Film Festival, Siddiqui had spoken about how he used to be annoyed at being called “unconventionally looking”. Even his NSD (National School of Drama) batchmate, lyricist Swanand Kirkire, in an interview, mentioned how the industry was cruel to him as he didn’t fit their definition of a hero. Does the actor consider it the industry’s failure that it doesn’t trust actors who don’t fit its stereotype of how a hero should look?

“But those, whom you are trusting, what are they doing? We are seeing what’s happening to the films that are coming nowadays with new actors,” he shoots back, before continuing, “The problem is, whether it was Irrfan [Khan] bhai, or Manoj [Bajpayee], Naseeruddin [Shah] saab or Om Puri saab, has anyone ever made a film with them worth Rs. 20-30 crore? Today, you shower praise at them and call them great actors, but no one ever made a big film with them. It happens only here. Internationally, they don’t differentiate between actors. They just cast a good actor. Here, we have categories like actor, hero, star, superstar. We have such great actors among us, you will spot them in movies or series in smaller roles. They aren’t supporting actors. They are great actors. Yet no one thought of making a film with them. And maybe no one ever will. We will be gone one day, but this will go on.”

When we mention that director Anurag Kashyap got offers recently to make the third edition of Gangs Of Wasseypur, Nawazuddin Siddiqui promptly tells us, “Anurag won’t make it. Neither will I act in it. I get such offers so much. People even tell me, ‘Lets take your character of Faizal Khan from Gangs and make a film on him.’”

Nawazuddin Siddiqui is currently consumed by the world created by filmmaker Honey Trehan. Five years after their maiden collaboration, Raat Akeli Hai, the duo is reuniting for the sequel of the thriller drama. The actor, who plays a cop in the film, informs us, “We have been shooting for it over the last two months. We have five more days of shoot left.”

Taking a day out from the shoot to attend the second edition of the Cinevesture International Film Festival, Siddiqui shares the challenges of being part of Trehan’s film.

“You can’t enjoy [yourself] in a Honey Trehan film,” he quips, adding, “He sets up difficult tasks for you. However, if you are able to do it, you leave the audience mighty impressed. Honey deliberately adds new dimensions to the characters in the script without telling you. That’s his process. It is such a wonderful discovery for an actor,” Siddiqui smiles.

While he is thrilled with the opportunities of diverse characters coming his way, he laments at the current state of Hindi cinema. The actor has realized that post the pandemic, the audience’s taste in movies has completely changed.

“It saddens me. It feels like we have regressed. Before the pandemic, small and medium-budget films were at least releasing in theatres and people were stepping out to watch them. Now, only lavishly-mounted films have space on the big screen. It’s a big loss for medium-budget films,” he says, adding that the box office collection has become a huge pull for the audience to give a film a chance. He recounts that this was not a practice before. “If someone said, ‘That actor gave a terrific performance,’ we all would be compelled to go and watch the film because we were curious about performances,” he explains.

Siddiqui, who has grown up watching films, including Ek Doctor Ki Maut (1990), Sparsh (1980) and Ardh Satya (1983), feels that ever since people have begun consuming content on mobile screens, the impact an in-depth performance brings is lost. “I might be wrong but I believe you won’t understand [in-depth] acting today even on the big screen because it’s lost in event films,” he expresses.

Besides Raat Akeli Hai, Nawazuddin Siddiqui is also shooting for Costao, based on the life of customs officer Costao Fernandez, produced by Bhanushali Studios. “It’s the story of a customs officer and what all he goes through. It’s a human drama,” he shares.