During the shooting of 'Manthan,' I lived in the hut, learnt to make cow dung cakes and milk a buffalo. I would carry the buckets and serve the milk to the unit to get the physicality of the character.
— Naseeruddin Shah
I don't see a future for Broadway-style theatre in India. We already have Hindi cinema, but small, intimate theatre will survive as long as people feel the need to talk to each other.
Nowhere else, perhaps, is the Quran recited so much and understood so little as in India.
Sometimes, more money is spent on promotion of a film than the making of it. I don't understand that logic. The movie should run on its merit.
I don't want any memorials or a grave which my children would have to look after or feel guilty about. I don't want to leave any trace except for the work I have done.
When I saw Spencer Tracy in 'The Old Man and the Sea,' I realised the distinction between being an actor and a film star. He was both, and I, too, resolved to try and be both.
I don't think anybody becomes an actor to serve theatre or to serve art anywhere. We all become actors because we are insecure people who want to be looked at. That was the reason I became an actor.
I was never turned down because I was a Muslim. I was turned down because I was not right for the part.
I'm not trying to prove myself a great filmmaker. I don't know much about filmmaking anyway. I'm trying my hand at it to see if I'm any good.
Everyone equates good cinema with boring shots and boring films - where a character takes 10 minutes to walk down a corridor, and still nothing happens at the end of the shot. Those films tried to be cool and fashionable by dispensing with drama, which, in my opinion, is absolute nonsense.
When my bank balance runs low, then I sign a big Bollywood monstrous movie, and I make sure that I am safe for the next few years.
The stuff that is done on Broadway is hardly theatre. It is part magic show, part rock concert, and part conjuring things.
I don't scoff at the desire to make good movies. I scoff at the quality at poseurs masquerading as masters of the medium.
I realise that I have made quite a few of the same mistakes with my kids that my dad made: not so much in trying to determine their lives for them but in terms of trying to discipline them.
There's so much hocus-pocus about acting styles; there's too much mysticism attached to it. But it's a craft like any other - it's something you have to work hard at.
Acting is learnt, not taught.
My dream is to produce a generation of actors who realise what the function of an actor in a movie is supposed to be.
An actor's job is to find variations of the same emotion in his being so that every time he expresses grief or joy, it doesn't look the same.
From playwrights I had never heard of and performance forms I had never seen to sculpture and painting, I gained immense experience as an actor in National School of Drama (NSD). I discovered what discipline and good taste in the theatre means.
Granted, patriotism is not a tonic that can be forced down people's throats.
I never go to film festivals. I am allergic to them.
Any youngster who comes to me and says he wants to act, I tell him to complete his education first because, for too long, uneducated actors have ruled the roost in the acting world.
When I was 14 and went on the stage for the first time, it stimulated me so much that I was convinced that I didn't want to do anything else.
Learning a craft is up to you, whether you are doing theatre or movies.
Hindi cinema has only one religion, and that's money.
It's a blessing to stay a child all your life - pretend to be this and that. And get paid for it.
You can't make a film for your personal satisfaction. That is why I detest the cinema of people like Mani Kaul.
The magic of theatre is how much can you stimulate the mind of the audience, not how many illusions you can create.
There is no such thing as serious cinema in India.
As an actor, you have got to learn your job as thoroughly as you can. If you know your job, then there's nothing that can stop you. Because the bottom line is that only good actors will get work.
My relationship with my father still troubles me because it never got resolved, and there was no closure. There was a lot of bitterness, but having written about it, I found that I was able to overcome that bitterness and look at the relationship anew.
The ballooning budgets of Bollywood are getting out of hand, and it's important for people to realise that you don't need Rs 20 crore to make a good, commercially viable film.
Actors have to learn that they are as important to a movie as the camera is, as important as the sound is, and less important than the script is.
It was the '70s when mediocrity came in Hindi films. That's when the actor called Rajesh Khanna joined the industry. For all his success, I think Mr. Khanna was a very limited actor. In fact, he was a poor actor.
When we finally become total slaves of mobile phones, then maybe theatre will die.
Given a choice, I prefer directing a play to a film.
Undeniable though it is that many Indian Muslims misguidedly consider Pakistan their haven, the immeasurably greater number who take intense pride in being Indian and who connect deeply with the country are hurt and angered at our patriotism being under scrutiny.
I have done practically everything that I wanted to do in my life.
Acting is no longer a taboo. The stigma has gone because people have realised that it's a perfectly valid career choice.
I'm not a political person; I'm not an activist. I'm not a guy with strong beliefs about anything. I have nothing to say to the world.
A family business in cinema is not necessarily creative. It is generally about prolonging your family fortune.
Humans are the only ones who are the custodians of other people's morals.
It is very tough to make a short film. It's like writing a short story, which is tougher than writing a novel. You can't afford to faff around; you can't indulge. You have to get to the point.
A lot of scripts are written with an eye on what will be popular or what will titillate or what this actor can do well. I don't think those kinds of scripts ever work.
To me, the most important elements in a theatre are the actors and the texts.
I do what work I get. I'm disappointed half the time.
There are a lot of people in my family who should have become actors.
There was a time when I only wanted to show off, but as I've grown older, I've realised that acting isn't an end in itself. You act to communicate something, and if you have to use an accent or become thin or fat, that's part of your job.
When I first dreamt of becoming a movie star, I wanted to be a Gary Cooper: I wanted to be rich and famous, living in palaces and wearing dark glasses and white suits.
I think our cinema has stayed in its adolescent stage largely because of our obsession with and our dependence upon stars to make our movies. The stars, being only too human, realise that this is the case, and so they milk it for whatever it's worth, and who can blame them?
