‘INDUSTRY PUTS YOU IN A BRACKET’

Kriti Sanon feels Bollywood lacks people who give more importance to actor’s potential than their on-screen image

In her three-year old career in Bollywood, actor Kriti Sanon (right) has portrayed a girl-next-door and a glamorous avatar. She feels she was “bracketed” right after her second outing. The 27-year-old actor, who made her debut with Heropanti (2014), followed it up with Dilwale (2015), and was recently seen in Raabta, says, “It isn’t so much about getting meaty roles as it is about getting typecast. When I had only done two films, I had meetings with a few people from the industry where they said, ‘This is not the kind of film you [would] like [to do],’” she says. “I was like, but how do you know what I like when I myself don’t know about it. I think people put you in a bracket quickly. They think ‘Oh, she has done commercial roles so may be she likes only this or can do only this,’” Kriti adds. Kriti says it’s important to find people in the industry, who are willing to explore an actor’s potential than going by their on-screen image. “Putting people in a bracket, where you feel they can only do what they’ve done till now is not right. You consciously need to follow your heart and do what you feel like to not fall in any bracket. It’s important to find someone who sees the actor inside you,” says Kriti. In the recently released film Bareilly Ki Barfi by filmmaker Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari, Kriti was seen in a de-glam avatar as a small town girl. “I’ve never played a small town girl before, picking up the dialect was refreshing. I didn’t have to wear much makeup, was wearing clothes I could sleep in. I used to sleep more because I used to take lesser time than the guys to get ready!” The actor recalls the time Ashwiny came to narrate the script to her. “I come from a normal middle class family in Delhi. I am very simple in every way. When I met Ashwiny, I was sitting crosslegged on the floor, wearing a loose T-shirt and a loosely tied bun, the way we are at home. She came and said, ‘Are you like this? Because I’ve always seen you in stylish clothes.’ At home, I am extremely simple.” On the failure of her film Raabta, Kriti says “As long as you’re trying something new and not being safe, it’s okay to fail,” she says.