RUSLAAN PACKS A PUNCH

[08 Apr 2008]
“I CAN’T COMPLAIN THAT RANBIR IS RISHI KAPOOR’S SON, SO HE GOT ‘SAAWARIYA’”
SOMETIMES PATIENCE, PERSISTENCE AND A POSITIVE ATTITUDE IS ALL YOU NEED TO GET A HEADSTART IN LIFE. LIKE MANY NEW HUMBLE BEGINNINGS WHICH SASHAYED INTO THE THEATRES LAST YEAR, RUSLAAN MUMTAAZ TOO MADE A MARK IN THE TINSEL TOWN. HE KNOWS HIS STRENGTHS AND IS WELL AWARE OF HIS WEAKNESSES. ARMED WITH HIS CHOCOLATE BOY LOOKS AND WILL TO MAKE IT BIG, THIS NEW KID ON THE BLOCK HAS EVERYTHING GOING FOR HIM AND HOW. Studying in the New Era High School, Panchgani, little did Ruslaan know that he would soon be following his mom Anjana Mumtaaz’s footsteps into the film industry? Post his graduation from NM College, Mumbai, things started changing for this young man when he started doing theatre, then modelling and joining Shiamak Dawar’s dance class and in a span of 3-4 years of doing it all, got ‘Mera Pehla Pehla Pyaar’. Ask him if he always wanted to be an actor and he says, “I decided to be an actor in the 2nd year of my college. We had these entrance exams for MBA and there was a course called IMS which I joined. And I did really badly on the first day of the mock test. I was always good in my studies but don’t know why I did so badly. After that when I was sitting outside with my friends, they said looking at my score which was the lowest of them all, ‘you act yaar, don’t get into this’. They were quite confident about it. So from that day onwards I gave acting a thought.”Didn’t his parents oppose his decision? “I didn’t tell them for years. I was doing a little bit of theatre and some workshop actually and they didn’t know that. When the workshop got over, there was a play. So I just told my mom that day, I want to be an actor so come and watch my play. And she was like ‘are you mad, don’t be an actor and all’. But later since I had called everyone she came to see the play with the entire family, my grand parents, my aunts and uncles, everyone. I thought it’s a big day so everyone should be there. When we were returning after the play in the car there was pin drop silence like nobody had anything to say to me. I think they were scared coz they didn’t know what to say as they had seen the worst performance ever. So when we came back home I said ‘I know it’s bad but you can tell me something at least. Where I can improve or how I did, anything.’ My mum just said one thing, ‘whatever you do, just don’t act’. I had supposedly been atrocious. (Laughs) Because of that reaction, somewhere I thought that now I need to prove it to them that I can act. So then I started doing theatre and I was totally into it. At one time I was doing three plays. From the time I woke up, I had rehearsals from 9 - 12 for one play and other till six and the next one from 7 -12, so my whole day went like that. I worked so hard for 3-4 months that I started becoming more comfortable with my acting. But I made sure I never called my parents for any of the plays. Through my plays somebody saw me and they asked me to audition for an ad and that’s how I got my first ad. After some seven ads I got ‘Mera Pehla Pehla Pyaar’ (MP3) so there was really not much time in between,” explains Ruslaan.Was it easier getting offers since his mom was already a known actress in the industry? “My dad was anyway against it coz he is not from the film background and my mom even though she is from it, kept telling me that ‘everyday there are hundreds of boys who come in the industry, who are better looking than you and they can’t make it in the industry so why would you make it? It’s not that somebody is launching you. These are some random people whom you are working with and what makes you think you are going to make it.’ She told me right in the beginning that she is not going to call people to tell them to take me. ‘I never made it like that and I am not going to do it for you’. Even for her work she doesn’t call people and tell them to take her. This was when I was starting out but when the movie released and they saw it they had respect for what I did and were more open to what I had to say. The thing is that they know I enjoy my work. And when they see me and they don’t feel ashamed, for me its half the battle won,” he justifies.
Was the decision to sign your debut film well received at home? “Things were just rolling too fast so we really didn’t have the time to say anything. When ‘MP3’ happened I read the scripts and decided that I wanted to do it. My mom was really worried because she had seen a bad performance and after that she had just seen my ads. She was worried as to what I am doing in the film and when it’s her name and stuff. But I was very comfortable and by the time I reached the set I was very confident. So when the film was complete I told my mom to see it. She went with my aunt. I was supposed to go but last moment I backed out as I thought she will be watching me or she will have some expression on her face or might say something, so I thought that I should stay out of this so that I don’t have to listen to ‘don’t act’ again,” he speaks animatedly.“She went there and I told her to call me during the interval but she didn’t call me. I kept waiting and I was thinking to myself, ‘was I so bad’? Then she called me after two hours and said ‘you have actually chosen the right profession and I am sorry, I was wrong about you earlier’,” beams the proud lad.Now that his debut film has long gone by, how has the industry’s reaction been? “There are many big people in the industry who have been in touch with me not because they are fond of me or they are working with me but just because they wish well for me. But they do tell me, ‘you are not bankable as an actor now so we can’t take you for our projects but one day we will’. I also know how things are and that there is also something known as box-office which is beyond talent and capabilities of an actor.” He continues, “You know what, I had played the role of a very young guy so some people tend to think that I am 17 years old and they are waiting for me to grow up. In the industry we don’t accept characters; they think it’s that person. That’s when we see the typecast thing happening. Because somewhere I knew while doing this film that I will have to lose weight and there is not much of dancing or any other thing that the filmi heroes do. I knew I will be typecast but the actor in me just said that maybe things are changing now.”Last year’s, over the top publicity stunts, star kids and their debuts being the hot topic; did he ever feel that all this had marred his debut? “Competitions and things like that will go on forever. This year was my first year so I was competing with the people who came with their debut film this year. But from next time onwards I will be competing with all the actors of the industry. From now on there is no debut for me. If I want to be nominated I will have to be nominated for the best actor’s category only. So I have to work anyways for that. I can’t complain that Ranbir is Rishi Kapoor’s son, so he got ‘Saawariya’. It’s not that. Everyone has a different way of getting things for themselves. Sometimes there are so many people who come from Delhi who end up doing serials. I, at least have my house here, so I can wait for two years and maintain myself. Just looking at somebody and saying that ‘oh I don’t have it going well for me’ is stupidity. Sometimes if I want to motivate myself I look at people below me and if I feel that I am rocking now, then I see the people above me, just to balance myself,” he speaks as a matter of fact and continues, “I think it’s a nice attitude. Because when you go to parties and people look at you and give you so much of attention, I feel, it’s so cool. Then suddenly I feel, ‘no there is still lot to do’. Sometimes I feel very down and out and think that people are doing so much better than me, then I just look at other people who are as talented as me but aren’t lucky enough to get even a good film. I have 2-3 films and I get offered one film everyday. Not that all of them are worth doing but at least there are people who show interest in me.”Talking about attention how has the female populace reacted to him? Does he notice the, ‘oh he’s so cute’ giggles around him? (Smiles) “The fan following that ‘MP3’ has garnered are very young. So I didn’t know that I have fans. I didn’t know what ‘MP3’ had done as a film or what I had achieved. It was just recently when I went to a college to judge a competition. It was my first time as a judge. There were 800 people in the audience and when I went up on stage to speak they didn’t let me say anything for at least five minutes. They kept saying, ‘I Love Ruslaan’. I had thought that my film had flopped. But I guess people saw the pirated copy or bought DVD’s or saw it on the internet. But the fan following I have is very young. They are in their teens. I think somewhere I always got female attention all through my school so I don’t make much of it.”For someone who says he doesn’t have a girlfriend does he talk about all this with his parents especially when he is bound to attract more of female attention as the time goes by? “We talk about it when we get letters from girls. They are very nice ones. I get a lot of letters from out of Bombay also. They send me questionnaire and they want me to fill it and send it back but I don’t,” he says sheepishly. “But sometimes I feel that I should send my pictures at least. And sometimes through family or when my dad meets people his friends’ kids tell him to send my pictures. I do whatever I can. Since I have not changed much I don’t know how to react to all these things. I cannot register all this, to an extent, because I still live the same way and I didn’t change my lifestyle much.
The things I did before MP3 I still do. If I don’t want to drive I will take a rick to gym. Sometimes when I am walking on the street I know that girls look at me. At times girls bump into me and I hear them say, ‘I touched him, I touched him’. That’s the time I realise that ok there is a change,” he speaks modestly. This change may be just the start of what it feels to gain stardom and live with it and the projects that he is getting will only push him towards the spotlight. For starters, he is roped in by Satish Kaushik for ‘Tere Sang’ with Sheena, actress Sadhana Singh’s daughter, Rajat Kapoor, Neena Gupta, Satish Kaushik and Sushmita Mukherjee. “I met Satishji and he said I like you and we will plan something together. What happens is that when you meet people they all say the same thing. So I really didn’t believe him then. I thought he was just being polite. He said that, ‘you are very good. You are like Shaahid (Kapoor) and I am surely going to work with you. Then 3-4 months down the line he hadn’t contacted me or said anything. So when I got ‘MP3’, I started working on it. Half way through ‘MP3’ Satishji called me and said, ‘I have a film so come and do it’. When I said I couldn’t, he said he would look for someone new because he wanted to launch a new guy. Then he did his hunt and search and all. The look for both the films (‘MP3’ and ‘Tere Sang’) was same. They both needed a17 years old so I knew that it’s quite tough to get a 17 year old guy. I mean a guy who looks 17. So I told Satishji , ‘Sir aapko koi nahi milega.’ And I don’t know why but I was just a little bit over confident. I was a bit arrogant. I said ‘sir aapko mujh se better nahi milega aap dekh lo’. I told him like that and I came home. My mom asked how could I speak like this with him. Then even I realised that was a little over the top. He called me after one month and asked if I will test for the film. I agreed and I gave many tests and I got the film,” he informs. Apart from that he has signed Milap Zaveri’s film, which is produced by Nikhil Advani with Ayesha Takia and Riteish Deshmukh, titled ‘Jaane Kahaan Se Ayi Hai’, Anupam Kher’s film which is still in initial stages and the recent one being ‘The Last Pharaoh’ by the director Christopher Miles where he plays the title role. Phew! With the going this great whoever is complaining!

**BY SUNAINA CHANDRAN

LINK:http://www.magnamags.com/magnamags/content/view/1458/56/lang,english/