Frankly I’ve never really subscribed to these adjectives tagging me as an ‘icon’, ‘superstar’, etc. I’ve always thought of myself as an actor doing his job to the best of his ability.
The select group of people who do make realistic cinema, who do make cinema perhaps a little more acceptable to the Western audience, is a very small percentage.
I like to feel the butterflies in the stomach, I like to go home and have a restless night and wonder how I’m going to be able to accomplish this feat, get jittery. That hunger and those butterflies in the stomach are very essential for all creative people.
Indian actors, because of the format of our stories, need to be good actors, and be able to perform emotional sequences, do a bit of comedy, dance and singing, action, because all of this forms just one film. In many ways I’d say there are greater demands on Indian actors than there are on Hollywood.
