Vicky Kaushal is one actor who cannot be boxed or caged in one genre. Right from his immersive act in Masaan to the brooding intensity he displayed in URI: The Surgical Strike, from the naïveté in Zubaan to the haunting portrayal in Sardar Udham, his range and risks know no bounds. He’s now gearing up for Govinda Naam Mera, where he amalgamates all possible genres. And in an exclusive interview with Firstpost, Vicky Kaushal talks about how the brand of Govinda and Kader Khan’s cinema inspired him and this film, the thoughts that were running through his mind a day before his Bollywood debut, and Govinda Naam Mera releasing directly on OTT.
What was going through your mind on the night of 23rd July, 2015?
I’ll tell you what I was doing, I was right outside PVR Citi Mall and I saw the poster of Masaan. I was saying to myself that for years I used to watch the posters of other films getting hung over there. It was my dream to see my films’ posters getting hung and on Thursday night, I was literally looking at that poster.
Govinda Naam Mera is a comic thriller but it adds other emotions into the narrative as well, be it romance, distress, panic, fear. How did you ensure you don’t leave the mood of the film by jumping from one emotion to another?
I think you just need to know what the character is, no matter what the emotion is. Shashank Khaitan and I were on the same page when we decided this is what the character is, this is how he would react to different situations. Govinda Waghmare is a guy who’s always in the middle of some problem, and like a typical Indian Mumbaikar, he’s a jugaadu guy. He will find a way to spin around things despite going through so much trauma everyday. He’s getting beaten up by his wife, professional life is in jeopardy, the house he stays in has some legal issues, and amid all this, there’s a murder and he’s the suspect. How he would come out of this is the story. We go through so much in our lives and still find comedy in it. That’s what the film is all about.
How was it like singing in Mika Singh’s voice?
Superb. I’ve been a big fan of Mika Singh, his songs and powerful voice. And now when I got to do a song in his voice, it was very fulfilling.
When Mr. Kader Khan passed away, you tweeted the one film you saw over and over again while growing up was Baap Numberi Beta Dus Numberi. How has his writing and acting influenced and inspired you as an actor?
Immensely, immensely. Somewhere, Govinda Naam Mera is an ode to those films of Govinda, Kader Khan, Johny Lever. Shashank and I are both 90s kids, we grew up in the 90s. We grew up on films like Dulhe Raja, Raja Babu, Ankhiyon Se Goli Maare, Joru Ka Ghulam, all these spectacular films. I’m sub-consciously inspired and influenced by Govinda, Kader Khan, Johny Lever, Shakti Kapoor.
You assisted Anurag Kashyap on Gangs of Wasseypur and the action of that film was designed by your father Sham Kaushal. Observing him on the sets and otherwise, what do you feel he gets about the action right?
I think the realness and rawness. My personal favorites of him are Prahaar, Black Friday, and Gangs of Wasseypur. When you talk about real action, brawl, what you see in life, he designs that action. This is also because of the kind of life he has lived, he has come from like a very poor background. In action, after four punches, everything looks the same if it’s not backed by emotions, so he’s always concentrating on what the emotion is.
You and Kiara did Lust Stories together. In these last five years, how much do you feel you both have evolved as actors?
We both have evolved a lot. The one common factor between us is that we both are enthusiastic learners. We both are thorough professionals and whenever we are on sets, we are trying to learn new things. We both have the same frequency and we both enjoy working with each other. Although Kiara is an immensely busy person right now.
You were being haunted by Bhumi Pednekar’s visions in Bhoot, and here, she’s literally haunting you. Your thoughts.
Bhumi was scaring me as a ghost there, and she’s scaring me by beating me up here. But she brings in an energy like no one else. The kind of spunk she has in her character in Govinda Naam Mera, she actually comes into her own with this film. She doesn’t give anything thanda, it’s spicy, it’s masaledaar, it has got an energy to it and it really helps the co-actor a lot because he has to throw the same energy back. I really enjoy when there’s a lively actor in front of me.
Are you confident people are going to enjoy Govinda Naam Mera on OTT as much as they would’ve enjoyed in cinemas?
I think so yes. Comedy, in general, is a community-viewing experience. Sometimes you laugh at someone else’s laugh, that is there. Today, we are living at a time where if it’s a good film, it works. There’s a lot of comedic stuff on OTT that you enjoy after having done your work, so Govinda is for that audience also. We belong to a country full of joint families. Govinda is a perfect film for them to come together and watch the film. Otherwise what happens is, children are in school, parents are at work, grandparents are alone at home, they all wonder when the family will get together. This is a film they can watch when at 12 am, watch together and laugh together.
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