Chiraiya actor Siddharth Shaw was recently in the National Capital, where he sat down for a fun chat with HT City in Khan Market. He opened up about his childhood dreams of becoming an actor and what it feels like to finally shine onscreen. When asked if being an outsider came with its fair share of struggles, Siddharth shared that every film has its own journey whereas every actor has their own destiny. “Whatever is meant for you will eventually come to you. Yes, being an outsider makes it tougher to reach the audience, but the tag doesn’t decide if you will or won’t get cast for a role. At the end of the day, we are a strictly B2C (Business-to-Consumer) industry. If the consumer, the dear audience does not accept us, there is no way that you will get work, irrespective of what family you come from,” said the actor.
Siddharth explained, “Yes, coming from a film family gives you leverage, your parents have been working there, so you already know people. However, if you’re not good, the audience will not accept you. Same happens with us (outsiders). On the contrary, we are rather blessed. Whatever we are doing is fresh because the audience doesn’t have a point of comparison to our parents.”
Siddharth looks at being an outsider as a ‘blessing’. “Whatever we are doing is fresh because the audience doesn’t have a point of comparison to our parents,” shares the Love Aaj Kal actor. Explaining how audiences genuinely want outsiders to succeed, Siddharth shares, “There is such a strong nepo-bias out there today that people have this cancel culture against individuals from the film fraternity already. The gods are in our favour today! (laughs).”
Ask him if he ever had a Plan B in case things didn’t work out in this profession, Siddharth compares it to going for war. “When you’re at war and you’re thinking about running away from the battlefield, you’ve already lost the battle. You can’t come with a contingency plan, ‘If this doesn’t work, I’ll do something else.’ Then you might as well just do something else, boss!”
The actor further explained, “Since there’s this whole debate of you being from the outside, trying to infiltrate the profession which has not been given to you by your forefathers. You are trying to break in and make your name. In that space there will be challenges, there will be barriers, and you will fight them. But if you have a plan B, that’s being escapist, in my opinion. Therefore I don’t. If I deviate my energy, I’ll get so engrossed in the backup that I won’t be able to give acting my full focus.”
In Chiraiya, Siddharth portrayed the role of Arun Kumar, the negative lead. Also starring Divya Dutta, Prasanna Bisht and Sanjay Mishra, the series exposes the dark reality of non-consensual intimacy within marriage.