He takes a quick dive into the works of his mentor, the late cinematographer Varinder Verma.
During our conversation, he recollects the difficult time he had in transitioning from theatre to film.
With over 150 films to his credit, the 40-year-old actor-director will be seen in Sundar C’s upcoming Raazi.
In this wide-ranging conversation, he talks about the turning point in his career, how he fared in the Bollywood industry as a first-time director, what changed with his father’s condition, the best part of being an actor and more.
Read the edited transcript of the conversation with Akhil Khurrana here:
Akki, with 150 movies in your career, what are the things that still make you work?
Akki, you always keep challenging yourself. If you stay stable and don’t grow, you will lose all the knowledge you had. It’s like the ageing process. There’s no end to it, so keep learning.
It’s about reaching people, not reaching the same people, right? You have to grow.
If you just depend on your past achievements, then you will lose everything. You have to reach out.
I would say since I became the assistant of the late cinematographer Varinder Verma, he was a mentor for me. Varinder was a teacher to me. He would not just teach you about film but would teach you about the whole world. He was the only guy who was aware of my theatre background and what I was doing in the theatre.
There were lots of aam raha hoon, you know (I used to be like this).
When I finally made it to Mumbai, he would come with me. He would just teach me this and that. He would take me out to the dhabas, shopping malls. Sometimes we’d take long drives. We would be together for four to five hours and he would keep talking about music, about films. He would just teach me about cinema.
I was learning about cinema, my friend. Because he was not just a cameraman but an artist. I would accompany him to his sets. One day, he got me a camera for my theatre production and he said, ‘It’s all you, now take it out and shoot’
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