‘DELHI AND NSD HAVE A LOT OF CONTRIBUTION IN SHAPING ME’
Actor Pankaj Kapur reflects on theatre and says the number of people going to watch plays has increased
Three-time National Award-winning actor and theatre personality, Pankaj Kapur, left the audience in a spell with his play, Dopehri, which was staged recently in the Capital and Gurgaon. The play is a dramatic retelling of a novella the actor wrote many years ago. A National School of Drama alumnus, the actor believes that the institution is largely responsible for shaping him as a performer. “I was 19 when I joined NSD. The city (Delhi), Ebrahim Alkazi — the director of the institute, and the staff at that time had a lot of contribution in shaping me as an actor. Those three years of my life, I was at my most impressionable because I was exposed to the right stuff, and it helped me create a base.”
It was with this play that the actor, known for his performances in films such as Mohan Joshi Haazir Ho! (1984), Ek Doctor Ki Maut (1990), and Maqbool (2003), returned to theatre after two decades. Talking about how the theatre scene has changed in the intervening years, Kapur says, “I believe that the number of people going to watch plays has increased in all these years. But we haven’t had a historical continuation of theatre in the sense of a theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare. But we can reach up to that mark. I’ve seen improvement. There should be more institutes and people, and we have to be more conducive to theatre.”
Kapur, who recently became a grandfather (with the birth of Misha, daughter of his son, actor Shahid Kapoor), talks about the extra media exposure kids have to deal with these days. “Children should be kept as normal as possible. At a very young age, they are not even aware of the happenings around them. You need to do whatever you can to grow them normally. But it depends on an individual’s choice. Different parents have different approaches.”
We haven’t had a historical continuation of theatre in the sense of a theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare. But we can reach up to that mark.
PANKAJ KAPUR, ACTOR