Swnanand Kirkire blames nepotism for Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s late breakthrough: ‘His acting abilities were doubted because he wasn’t conventionally good-looking’ | Bollywood News
Nawazuddin Siddiqui made his debut as a lead actor in Anurag Kashyap’s 2012 cult crime epic Gangs of Wasseypur – Part 2, and there was no looking back. However, he spent 13 years playing small roles in major films before his breakthrough.
His batchmate from National School of Drama, actor-lyric-singer Swanand Kirkire, reasoned why it took so long for the Hindi film industry to accept Nawazuddin in a lead role. “Neither theatre actors nor theatre actresses are conventionally good looking. There’s only one Anurag Kashyap who’d make Nawazuddin the hero, otherwise who would? He gave Nawaz a big enough role that the film rested on his shoulders. People love Nawaz so much now because a few believed in him. Otherwise we’ve all seen the Nawaz pre-Gangs of Wasseypur. People have doubted him and asked, ‘How will he act?’ There’s been so much cruelty against him,” said Swanand.
In the interview with The Lallantop, Swanand Kirkire said all issues like these boil down to the root cause of nepotism. “Ye cinema ke log, ye cinema ke bachche, aur ye non-cinema ke bachche (there are people of cinema, children of cinema, and children of non-cinema),” pointed out Swanand, adding that nepotism is pervasive. “Even in Indian classical music, the guru has always discriminated between his disciple and his children. The same discrimination exs even in advocacy with lawyers,” said Swanand.
Story continues below this ad
Also Read | ‘Heartbroken’ Nawazuddin Siddiqui cried bitterly after Kamal Haasan cut his role in Hey Ram; Hema Malini rejected Esha Deol’s casting
Nawazuddin Siddiqui began his acting career with a small part in John Matthew Mathan’s 1999 cop drama Sarfarosh alongside Aamir Khan. He followed it up with brief appearances in Ram Gopal Varma’s 1999 crime drama Shool, Rajkumar Hirani’s 2003 blockbuster gangster comedy Munna Bhai MBBS, Anurag Kashyap’s 2007 crime drama Black Friday, Kabir Khan’s 2009 thriller New York, Anurag’s 2009 romantic film Dev. D, Anusha Rizvi’s 2010 satire Peepli Live, Sujoy Ghosh’s 2011 thriller Kahaani, and Tigmanshu Dhulia’s 2012 sports drama Paan Singh Tomar.
After his breakthrough with Gangs of Wasseypur: Part 2, Nawazuddin has led films like Ketan Mehta’s Manjhi – The Mountain Man (2015), Anurag’s Raman Raghav 2.0 (2016), Sohail Khan’s Freaky Ali (2016), Shlok Sharma’s Haraamkhor (2017), Babumoshai Bandookbaaz (2017), Nandita Das’ Manto (2018), Thackeray (2019), Ritesh Batra’s Photograph (2019), Tannishtha Chatterjee’s Roam Rome Mein (2019), Motichoor Chaknachoor (2019), Ghoomketu (2020), Honey Trehan’s Raat Akeli Hai (2020), Sudhir Mishra’s Serious Men (2020), No Land’s Man (2021), Sudhir Mishra’s Afwaah (2023), Jogira Sara Ra Ra (2023), Tiku Weds Sheru (2023), Haddi (2023), Rautu Ka Raaz (2024), and Adbhut (2024). He’s also headlined two seasons of Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane’s Netflix India Original show Sacred Games. Nawazuddin will be next seen in the lead role in the film Costao, which will drop on ZEE5 on May 1.
Also Read | ‘Nawazuddin Siddiqui was carrying Rajpal Yadav’s suitcase’: Anurag Kashyap recalls actor told him ‘I don’t have money to eat’Story continues below this ad
In the interview, Swanand also admitted that there are more male actors from NSD who’ve grabbed lead roles than their female counterparts. Case in point: Naseeruddin Shah, Om Puri, Pankaj Kapur, and Irrfan Khan. “In my time, 16-18-year old girls were made actors. An NSD graduate has to study for three years, do theatre, and then consider moving to Mumbai. that time, they miss the criteria that the industry has set,” said Swanand. He cited Rasika Dugal, Anjali Patil, and Monika Pawar as great products of NSD in the film industry.
