It’s wonderful to be compared to Fawad Khan: Ishwak Singh
Actor Ishwak Singh has starred in commercial as well as offbeat films. Although he enjoys both “creatively”, he admits that there’s a “difference” in their impact. “I enjoy every kind of role, be it small or big. I was there a little bit in Imtiaz Ali’s Tamasha (2015), and for other films, too, my approach has been the same, I just immerse myself,” says Ishwak, who played the role of Nirmal opposite Sonam Kapoor Ahuja in VDW.
He adds, “I shot for Aligarh (2016) with Manoj Bajpayee, and was expecting some things which didn’t happen finally, in terms of recognition. [But] I now realise the difference, after doing Veere Di Wedding (VDW; 2018), that commercial films give you recognition. Creatively, however, every film is the same.”
What has perhaps added to his popularity is people calling him Pakistani actor Fawad Khan’s lookalike. When asked about it, the actor laughs, “It’s a wonderful thing to be compared to him. As a kid, too, people around me would say, ‘Oh, you look like this actor, that actor’ or ‘this tennis player’. People have been amazing and generous in compliments, and it’s even more amazing when I am compared at this level.”
Apart from films, Ishwak is a part of a Delhi-based theatre group too. Asked whether he’d prefer to be called a theatre actor dabbling in films, or the other way around? “Acting is acting, whether you are on stage, or in front of the camera ...I don’t want to give any labels, good acting will matter wherever you do it,” he says.