[Music] [Music] [Music] as an entrepreneur we speak mostly to Young wannabe 20-year-old boys and girls who want to start a business to be desirable uh from the length of getting funding to be wanted I think that innate quality uh I feel like you do it very well you want to be able to teach a young guy or girl how to emulate that hi rir how is it going uh uh nervous uh excited you know over the years I've heard so much about you about your achievements and and all of that but I uh uh I was on reals one day on Instagram and I came across this one real of yours where you spoke about uh was it Detachment indifference Detachment Detachment and it was was something which really resonated with me because I felt like okay that's something that I connected with uh it's not something that I probably believe also but it's not something that I could say it openly uh I was very afraid to say something like that uh and I think that really kind of I I felt you there you know so uh so I got very excited to speak to you and really happy to be on the show and I looked for a bunch of interviews of yours for some reason you never do one more than 20 minutes uh no because that's the thing right when you when you're promoting a film that's the only time you give interviews it's so film Centric and it's sometimes it's I think the relationship of film actors with Indian media especially entertainment media is a bit um shaky it's because you start talking to them before the film is released and people are not really interested in knowing about the film as much as they're interested in your personal life as much as at one time it was my marriage then it was Raha then it was how's fatherhood so that's what stands out you know so I think a lot of actors and film people realize that interviews is not the way to go to promote a film uh you have something inspiring to say uh then do an interview and that's what I believe in because when you talk you're inspiring you're inspiring people you're sharing your own experiences if you don't have anything to share I'm not interested in talking about myself I'm not interested in talking about my achievements or or my personal achievements uh but something like this uh is is stimulating is stimulating for me it's inspiring for me and I hope like with this conversation we can Inspire somebody you know with some experience yeah I have a lot of curiosity around our conversations that day and I genuinely wanted to get to know you more uh so I have no questions for today perfect uh I'll set context and say I don't know too much about Bollywood uh so I I wouldn't ask you too many questions about a movie or Bollywood or this great great and uh there is one Nuance that I I am very interested in uh we all project and we depict a version of ourself to the world but as an entrepreneur I we speak mostly to Young wannabe 20-year-old boys and girls who want to start a business who want to build something for themselves to be desirable uh from the length of getting funding to be wanted to be uh to be in a room and have people be interested in you I think that innate quality is inculcated by many people but uh I feel like you do it very well so if we can arrive beginning at your childhood up until now and try and figure out how you got to be this way how when you interact with people you leave them a bit interested you leave them intrigued uh nobody knows too much about your life you want to be able to teach a young guy or girl how to emulate that if we can capture that somewhere along our catchup that' be quite interesting so I'm supposed to like speak monologue right now no no no monologue uh you tell me a part of your life childhood I'll tell you a part of mine great so we can go back and forth when did you start yeah sure uh I mean everything I I know everything from you joining a call center till now so anything before that is something I'm interested in yeah born in shimoga in Karnataka okay Dad worked in canra Bank uh so he got transferred typic once every 3 years uh moved from shimoga to Hassen again in Karnataka then went to harana lived in a place called caral for 3 years great experiences still have some friends from caral uh you finish your schooling then I stayed in caral till I was about 6 or S I would like to say okay then came to Bangalore uh then when my dad got transferred beyond that we didn't travel with him okay but we stayed in Bangalore with my mother and my mother's family was here in uh in Bangalore my grandmother her brother yeah when she was alive they were all in Bangalore and uh from the age of 7 till 37 for the last 30 years I've been pretty much a Bangalore boy have immense love for the city uh which has in a way given me everything and uh I think it's a two-way love uh I I showcase it a lot and I think the city continues to love me hence I was telling you the other day you should come to bang and hang out uh it's it's very different from Mumbai uh not not in the way that you typically hear from people that Mumbai is fast that city is slow uh one city is flashy another is not not uh not in such an obvious way but in a very nuanced way I think every city is different mhm uh Bangalore has uh a soul which is different from Mumbai soul and I feel like you have to be there to experience it nice okay you do you anys coming back to my childhood so I was um born to Rishi kapor and nitu Singh who are actors MH um I am four generation in my family of actors um I grew up uh uh in a privileged household I went to Bombay Scottish School uh I was not really good at studies uh because very early on I realized to become an actor you don't need to study so I used that to my advantage um how did you know you want to be an actor I don't think I ever there was a day where I said Okay I want to be an actor I think because you are a star kid uh so there is so much of attention um see the thing is in school if you get attention from a girl you feel like oh actor I mean it starts there you know the confidence comes in uh then being from the family that I come from it was taken for granted uh but I like I remember whenever I used to do like Dramatics in school I was not really good I was not I was never selected um I was an introvert I still am um I was very good in football so football gave me a purpose it gave me a sense of um okay I'm decent at something was I was below average in everything um did you get treated specially in school and being uh not speci no I got beaten up by everybody the teachers the principal I remember one day I was crawling out of class we about the same age no I'm 41 82 born similar yeah so but I was in a um like convent school so like they were very strict they used to hit us with canes and like dusters on the knuckles and all of that so I've gone through all of that and being a naughty kid and because they thought that I was the celebrity kid and I was going out of control they used to kind of pick on me a little bit more uh having said that no I I I don't want like about my te teach and principal because I really had a good time in school I went to Bombay Scottish which a school in mahim then I went to HR College um I got 54.3 in my 10th standard boards and when I got that I was in New York because my father was directing a movie called AB L and when and my mother was in Mumbai and when she heard of the result she called us I haven't seen happiness in my family's face as what like when I what I witnessed when they heard that I got 54.3 they thought like genius like nobody had passed my family the seventh Dropout eighth Dropout ninth Dropout so that they really thought okay this guy can achieve something in life did a little bit of assisting on a film called AB L which didn't work my father directed that film realized that my father is a terrific actor but he's not that good a director because he doesn't have a temperament to be a director he's very short tempered what is a director's temperament it's very hard yeah n because you are basically it's such a selfless job a good director uh you know you're doing everybody's job but giving them the credit for it you know um you are the boss on set and any decision is your decision like they'll come to you even for like a color or like lensing or lighting or performance everything's up to you so it's kind of you playing God in a way um so anyway my father was not cut out for that I went to HR College uh in Mumbai uh never saw a classroom um just had Dosa outside I went and uh the the pool bug had hit everyone right snooker and pool and B bowling uh there was a very cool place called the bowling company which had opened in Mumbai and that was a a haunt so all my the two years of my college life I've spent there then I went to New York I went to a film school called School of Visual Arts uh I didn't score very good in my SAT so I didn't get into NYU USC or UCLA so I got into this school SVA which is pretty good it's a um graphic design school that's what they specialize in so did Direction there I realized that my passion was growing more towards Direction than acting um made a lot of short films which I'm very embarrassed about uh but got an understanding of how movies are made but it's only after I came back to Mumbai after I dropped out of it was an undergrad course a foure undergrad course I finished all my film classes didn't take humanity and science classes dropped out because I said you know I just needed to get some experience in film so I dropped out I came back my father said I'm too young and I suddenly started getting a lot of attention from directors and people and media and said go back to America spend a year do something useful that you could help you so I enrolled myself at the least drabber theater Institute that's popular right I've heard of it it's popular they teach you the method I'm not a really big fan uh of the method but I think by then I was very eager to come back and start work you know I felt like okay I'd got the experience of America um it was not really the college experience but just the experience of the exposure you know just interacting with students from all over the world living alone um my father kept me on a very tight budget um just to give you an example uh uh of course when I say tight budget I'm still come from a privileged background but it was enough that I could have a McDonald dollar menu meal uh for lunch and dinner so it was like $2 lunch $2 dinner you know it was as strict as that even though I come from a privileged background this was why do you think that is he's never addressed this or spoken to me about it but he really wanted me to like live like a student and not live like somebody who's why do you think Rich parents do that uh I don't know to teach you value for money um even when I came back and I started assisting Mr bansali on a film called black I was an assistant director he took away my car so I had to travel in public transport I was not getting any pocket money uh so I think he really wanted to school me in a way that yeah this is not life you know you're too moisturized you need to really see what hardship is whatever do you think they do that for you or for themsel to show that they are doing it see the thing is having a child and now since I have a child I also question that that if I'm doing something am I doing it because it is making me happy I'm because I feel this is good for her or it's for her so that question I'll never be able to answer you know but I do feel that my uh father was um he was a short-tempered man but he was a very good man you know he's somebody who uh really loved his family loved his work loved his food loved his alcohol you know he was a very open person he whatever he said he could he could speak about it um did you think of him that way from the very beginning like growing up to 10 i n never saw his eye color I was always like this I was just like yes I never said no you know I was so scared like the movie Animal I watched it was really good animal I was more obsessed with him year I was scared of my dad you know like I I like he never shouted at us he never raised his hand but just because around us his his temperament was so like volatile that it always scared me so um anybody who speaks in a louder tone from childhood it started disturbing my parents went through uh like shitloads of like fights you know where we live in a bungalow so I've spent like most of my childhood on the steak K just hearing them fight so I was always a little um scared you know I was always on the edge but I think both of them uh were going through a very rough patch they both loved each other and eventually they found beautiful companionship you know uh when my father was um suffering uh cancer and he he was abroad and I saw the kind of selfless service that my mother was was doing for him uh and and and that kind of love was something uh which I probably at that time wouldn't have imagined and in these confrontations did you try and stop it or did you partake any of course of course many of times um and the thing is it also happened when my sister just left for her further education so she was not around so I kind of felt responsible and my mother um uh really used to talk to me a lot about her feelings my father was not an expressive person so I never F I never understood or heard his point of view uh what was the issue what was going on why do you think he was the way he was I think that generation of men are scared of vulnerability uh yeah like even like to express his love to me he never could like hold my hand or could hug me but his hug had a you know it wasn't a hug um maybe I'm blaming it that is that generation but I don't know you know he he just was very distant I knew he loved me a lot he cared a lot for me do you think the movies of the time Define how very subconsciously the men of that generation want to be like do you think the movies of your father's time subconsciously made him who he is who he was I think that's how India was also now at that time I art imitates life life imitates art uh that goes on year by year but I think back then the kind of movies my father was doing um see it was was a way more forgiving audience Cinema was like a very big medium and it was apart from cricket it was the only source of entertainment at that time so you could be doing five films a year on on the same subject uh the same story you know lost and found uh it was the same thing but they were just doing the same stuff so they were very forgiving today's in today's DNA they're not forgiving when you speak about a film like animal animal became a huge success but I remember when I was offered the film and the first time I heard the story I got very scared scared I got very scared is because I've also kind of been um uh following a career path where I'm doing good roles and you know trying to give good social messages uh you know not trying to um do stuff which I kind of play the Good Boy basically you know coming of age that my romantic image that I had um so I found this very bold I found this very um um um adulterated I found this something which I was very scared that maybe the audience will not accept me and let me tell you like when the film was released even though it did amazing numbers and did really well and we got a lot of love there there is Big audience which uh found this film misogynist and found this film um wrong in somewhere I'm not saying this because you're sitting here uh I feel like I'll get into a little bit of trouble maybe for saying this but how can somebody be okay admiring Godfather where again gangster is killing 20 people and that is okay his own brother yeah but this is not okay I don't think movies should be where Society derives their sense of morality movie is a medium of entertainment right and you're portraying a story and doing it in the best that was the intention n but I think it was uh misconstrued and I think social media also played Havoc you know they they need something to talk about so they really went to town with claiming what a misogynist and what happens is that you know the hard that you put in and I know that this director also made a film called Kabir Singh which also faced the same thing uh it just gets diminished you know like there's a lot of hard work a lot of good intentions that went behind it but because it suddenly gets this tag which is not true the perception that you were talking about uh stayed with this film so animal though if you go to general public and they will really speak very fondly about the film uh but there are many people who I meet who are like uh you shouldn't have done this film and we so disappointed in you and a lot of people from the film industry um so I just quietly apologize I said sorry I I won't do it next time I don't really agree with them but I'm not I'm in that phase in my life that I really don't argue with anybody and if you don't like my work I'll say sorry I'll try harder next time if you had to do it all over again would you 100% the kind of um see I was kind of stagnating and hitting a saturation point in my career I was called the next Superstar for a very long time and I I'm not saying I'm a superstar today unless you don't have that continuous uh uh Blockbuster films you can't be called a superstar uh but I think animal what it did is it was the correct film at the right time uh to kind of just at least take another step up otherwise I've been kind of flatlined in the same status so that was very important for me for my confidence it was very important for me to kind of change uh you know shift from a boy to a man in some ways going back to Childhood uh sister how is that relationship uh sister uh is 2 years Elder to me we uh um I love we shared a room together till I was in the seventh grade so I was 13 and she was 15 she used to beat me up first because she was bigger than me uh she was a bit chubby but when I grew in size then I used to beat her uh do all the WWF stunts with her um then she got the thing is she left for a further education to London by the time she came back I went to New York by the time I finished and came back she got married so you know I I missed out on the good years of of bonding with her um she's married in Delhi she has a beautiful 13-year-old uh daughter her name is Samara I love my brother-in-law great super guy I don't know if you ever met him um his name is bhat um so she's happy uh uh she's um she's in a good space I'm happy for her but I'm not as close to her as I would like to be um again it goes back to that indifferent Detachment um I've always been that person you think you're that avoidant attached I think so always and this is not something that I became after I became a working professional I was like this at a very young age I think I have this Fain memory I don't know which friend this was but I think when I was like four or five this whenever this friend used to leave home after playing with me it used to really burn inside like something used to break and I think maybe uh I just closed up and I just detached myself from everybody maybe it was that maybe I was born that way I don't know but I do have memory of feeling a lot of pain when that person was going away um but but having said that now that I am a father and I have a daughter uh that's a game changer so that is making me question Detachment and indifference um because I feel like like I was just born you know like I I was reborn right now so the 40 years of my life that I've lived was another life this is another life which is which is starting so feeling a lot of new kind of emotions lot of new kind of feelings are creeping in um new thoughts I never feared death I always said that I would die at the age of 71 uh because I had this obsession with the number eight I don't know why I said that I don't sound cool or what but now I'm like that's too soon that's like another 30 years I only live at least for 40 more years so all that has changed a bit now because I have a daughter what's that feeling see I don't know it of having a child will you get married though I asked you and you said no no intent of I don't see myself getting married or having kids n what if somebody just sweeps you off your face and you just fall head over heels in love then we had this conversation as I know but let the people need to hear this like my t-shirt today says uh transient that word means a lot to me why is that I feel like I have changed as a person every year in the last 10 years what I thought I wanted today uh has been totally different from what I wanted the next year and I would hate to commit the present version of myself to another person when I know I'm going to change so much I have two questions for you um let me ask a second question first so when you're 70 M paint a picture like how do you want your life to be apart from your professional achievements no I think about this all the time uh I have friends uh you know this lady from biocon Kirin we live in the same apartment uh we hang out a lot she's also part of your your giving yeah she's part of the giving pledge but she's 70 doesn't have kids uh husband passed away last year and I keep asking her are you lonely are you this way are you that way how do you feel about this how do you feel about that uh like I really admire admire her for so many things but she seems very fulfilled in life uh I don't think she is lacking one particular thing that she would have had if she had kids uh she's a very complete person I I love how she's able to be a lot more altruistic in life even versus if she were to have had her own kids uh it's good for society it's uh good in a in a very in a society with up and down to have somebody with a really high moral compass and altruism by virtue of their situation in life it kind of negates some of the bad in society I feel like I wouldn't hit myself if I were 70 and in her place she's exactly 70 it was her 70th birthday last year would you be as uh open and giving as her at that age I would be you would be yeah I mean I do you still be working I think so I feel like uh I enjoy having something to do every day I have at times uh even when I have 3 4 days off right and I have no work I don't feel happy about it I feel like do you have any other passions from any other passions outside of work sport or a hobby yeah I play batminton sometimes I used to play football I go to the gym once in a while I read some books uh once in a while as you have a trainer you have a program or you just go because you just feel like no no I have a trainer who I've had for a long time he's more like my uh social interaction of the day in Bangalore so Bangalore I don't particularly or in Bombay I don't go out go out as such so you're talking about three things you had 70 Sports Hobby and will you retire I want to know these same things retirement I don't know it's not very appealing to me I'm like retire and do what if I had this passion in life that I have not been able to give time to and I can go into that maybe retire but I don't have such a thing I'm not found anything I'm I would be very insecure if I didn't have to go to work for a long time because I find a lot of my validation from my work and N when you say work it's not the companies where you're investing or what you have it could be something new right like you're not married to just the things that you're doing right now no no not at all like you like to try new things new businesses yeah but I'm not as composed as you know I sometimes project to be I'm always looking for uh validation in the small things in life and the big things in life validation from whom Val success validation to me is there is no person who's validating me it's somehow my own subconscious validating my conscious side don't get me wrong I care a lot about what people think and what my friends and my peers and colleagues and all and I I do care for what they think of me but that's not your inspiration yeah but deep down it is it's like going to the gym right like if you go to the gym and work out who are you really validating maybe it's your ego maybe it's your subconscious well you go to the gym you feel good about yourself which is healthier lifestyle confidence you know that kind of it has a result yeah but I'm saying but if you're if you're working are you working because you want to be more successful more Rich you want people to admire you like like what what what gets you off eventually uh I feel like in society everybody is chasing status which is differentiation from your fellow people uh it has been that way from the very beginning when there were Hunters you wanted to be the strongest Hunter when you were farmers you wanted it when you were in the era of capitalism you wanted it when you were in the era of religion you wanted that you wanted to maybe be the pope or high up in that hierarchy uh so like everybody else I am chasing status uh the definition of what and you haven't achieved it yet you feel I don't think anybody ever achieved status so it's an ongoing process yeah like you look at some of these uh really great people who write books while they're alive right like take Mar Marcus orelias or people who ruled the world and wrote while they were ruling the world you like Mar's writing yeah I like a couple of his books he talks about how what he had didn't matter while he was alive which is unlike somebody in his position I've not been able to do that in the manner that he has I still uh uh attached I'm still attached interesting while pretending to be detached and also being convinced of being detached myself a lot of the time that's also so true yeah yeah but coming back to you so sister mother father covered uh what happened h College time how did did everybody know pre goinging to New York to the film school that you're going to be an actor everybody knew who I was especially like you know you get pointed out a lot Kap you know all of that so you get attention but I was because I'm an introvert so I was always running away from it um new people um means new expectations new friends um I started smoking cigarettes um which became a very nasty habit for uh from the age of 17 till last year when I finally quit how did you manage that when I became a father mhm uh I started feeling very unhealthy mhm um so yeah HR College reminds me of smoking because it was the first time I bought a cigarette packet you know you share with your friends and you smoke outside and you feel grown up um and all of that first time that you're wearing your own clothes you know wearing a school for yeah um I've always been a fashion guy um yeah you're starting a sneaker brand uh you know n I've been talking about this actually for many years for actually 10 years uh I've been a sneakerhead since I was a kid uh into basketball and baseball and American Sports used to travel a lot to New York um so I'm very passionate about it but I uh I'm very scared because I'm scared is because I don't know India as well as I should I don't know the market I always question it that how come we don't have a Zara and H&M how come you don't have something with such a big consumer Market how come you don't have that um so yeah I I am planning to start a brand it's been couple of years that I'm working on it a Lifestyle brand um Essentials um something which street wear I think Street Wear is a bit bastardized now um so I think I would like to call it Essentials like what a white T-shirt should be like what jeans should be like what a white shirt should be like and of course sneak sneakers is because I love sneakers right um who are your favorite sneaker uh brand always an a Jordan fan uh I like the three the white cement the most uh the collaborations are good so an Air Jordan fan I know sneakers have also hit a a roadblock right now the especially the Jordans and the easys U so somebody has to come up with something new um the prices are dropping now right majorly majorly um so yeah I'm learning I don't want to I just don't want want to be this I don't like this word but this celebrity brand which tried and failed because so many of them have failed um having said that my wife is a very uh successful uh um owner of a brand she started um a toddler and children wear brand called edama um and it happened in front of my eyes and she was just amazing the fact that she chose to do something like this uh and she worked through lockdown and I saw the marketing genius that she was um I don't think I'm a marketing genius uh I do have an idea and a dream and a vision uh but I'm still trying to do the the groundwork you know just study the market meet people I met really interesting people um about their experiences uh so yeah I'm still learning and what do you feel though about this whole I feel like Indian celebrities shy away from being vocal about who they are as people they show the very media trained facet of them them and I feel like that worked 5 years ago I don't know if it works today because you can't fall in love with a face or the manner in which a person acts or the proper image that they project I think people fall in love with the flaws people fall in love with the vulnerabilities and uh so then is it like I'm taking advice from you because I'm an actor and I've always tried to stay away I've always tried to create a little bit of a mysterious aura because I'm a film actor and I I did realize very early on that if I was on social media also um people would get bored of me because I'm there for them to message and abuse me or say I love you or U I'm on endorsements and film marketing and my films are releasing it be too much of me so then where is the mystery um but if I try and control my narrative that okay this is rir and this is who I am this is who I like um will the media or the audience will they like that vanilla version even though it sounds vanilla or they want to create something which seems this guy is a celebrity so let's make it m masal I feel like if the real version of you with the flaws the vulnerabilities the strength all of that is depicted in a manner which is truly organic to you I I would assume like there will be some people who will troll you and dislike you and all of that but net net if you then sell sneakers I think more will sell I personally believe that cuz when you're buying George Clooney tequila what are you really buying you're buying him yeah right because I mean there's no differentiation in the product Beyond a point so beyond childhood okay we established you had avoidant attachment a bit like me yeah hit confrontation to a certain extent great relationship with sister MH uh great relationship with my mother not so great with my father distant but loved and respected him uh stopped crying very early on uh and uh I just stopped crying uh yeah that's my childhood you know funny I I didn't cry when my father passed away I know that when the doctor told me the night that I was in the hospital I was spending the night there I stayed there for quite some time and he said that this is his last night and he's going to go anytime soon I remember I went up to the room and I got a panic attack CU I don't know how to express myself I don't know what was happening there's too much to take uh but I don't think I've I've grieved I don't think I've understood the loss uh I mean losing one of your parent is very big moment in any do you feel guilt I feel guilt as much as guilt as he felt while he was going away uh because that one year that we spent together in New York while treatment was on um he often spoke about that you know he one day I was there for like 45 days stretch and he came to my room and I just started crying and he's never showed that kind of weakness to me and it was so awkward for me because I didn't know if I should go hold him I should hug him um and I really realized the distance and I felt I feel guilty that I didn't have uh the grace to let go of the distance or the glass uh between us and go and hug him or give him some love uh so I have uh guilt for that uh yeah also you've been brought up saying that now you're responsible and this and that there certain things that play in your mind um I have a mother sister wife a child and my father passes away can I show my weakness I don't know what it is but I just didn't cry um and I have tried therapy before my father got sick um in London and I don't think therapy worked for me uh for two reasons firstly because I don't think I could completely honestly express myself to the therapist maybe I wasn't someone who I connected with and secondly I realized that the therapist in some way uh was teaching me how to manipulate life H um explain in a way that it became okay if this is say a conflict with a friend uh so there is a certain way there is a method that you can overcome this problem by doing certain things and whatever he was telling me about say relationships or or life it made me realize that I I don't want to manipulate life you know I don't want to put something in motion uh to avoid it because it gives me peace uh or it doesn't stress me out again maybe it was a bad therapist or maybe I enj with the therapist but that didn't work for right um lot of I'm often told by a lot of my friends and my new ones to try therapy is because I don't express myself I don't cry um so I have nothing against therapy it's just that I have to open myself up and I I'm very scared of opening myself up I guess yeah but if you are also an introvert how did you do it then when I went to her or whenever I go to therapy I go usually like once in a week or once in every two weeks do you go to therapy thinking like it's gym for the mind or do you go to therapy because you are you have something that you want unlock I feel like it makes me more efficient so it's basically when gym for the M yeah I feel like it makes me uh perform better even at work uh there's often things that sit in my head and I make them bigger than they actually are and somehow she puts it in context I say it myself and these people people put it in context like same example guilt right this is something I deal with all the time my dad passed away recently like 3 months ago and abruptly like we were not expecting it the the emotion that I dealt with right after that and even up until today is I can't look at his picture cuz then I start thinking we didn't live in the same house I started living alone when I was 17 18 years old he's obious he seen your success yeah he's seen proud of you yeah yeah we a loving relationship like never had a altercation very supportive uh but we didn't spend a lot of time together I would go visit him once in a week once in two weeks once in a month uh the guilt of not having done enough as a son uh and it it also so happened that when he passed away because it happened abruptly I was not here I was traveling it it's a weird experience I was in Dubai on on the way to a work meetings somewhere else and uh when I got the call from the hospital my mom said we're rushing him to the hospital and just before I boarded the flight back to Bangalore the doctor told me he's not making it like just actually I barded and just before taking off and it's a 3 hour flight to Bangalore 3 Hour 3 and a half hour flight to Bangalore and then you land in Bangalore there's traffic and then you take by the time you landed he was still alive no no no he was gone he was gone while I was on the flight and the doctor told me that they were not able to revive him but the guilt started becoming exponentially bigger from that point why am I not there he was there for me when I was a kid he was there for me when this when that when all of that that's not logical know this guil it's not logical but it's there it's not logical but it's there why did I not take him on that holiday why did I not do a bunch of things which just make me feel guilty why was I not nicer to him why did I not go to that one Function One Puja where he wanted to take me in his hometown in Udupi you think your brother was a better son uh he's Elder right he's he's he's older but he had a even worse experience cuz he was in Thailand at that point and he was not in town he was not in town and he could not get there for a day and a half so uh when we were sitting with the body right like and he took a day and a half he was trying frantically to come back but he just couldn't and there were no flights and the fastest one he took and he did all of that I think he felt a lot of guilt himself too uh I don't think he expressed it but these are small things which blow up like after he passed away uh we did you know there are so many prayers right Hindu Hindu Brahman family like every day there were prayers for 3 4 hours in the morning uh you go to a river you go to this Temple you go to that Temple day 13 of my dad passing away which was 3 months ago somewhere in Jan day 13 we went to eight temples in one day in UD in his hometown we said we will go do the last 13th day in his Hometown we did that came back to Bangalore day 15 brother has a stroke oh and then back to the hospital uh and while brother has a stroke sister-in-law so we're a tiny family father mother brother his wife and they they one kid while Nathan has a stroke on the 15th day his wife is in uh Dubai getting treated for cancer she had stage three cancer what's happening man yeah I know it's crazy right the the sequence of events is ridiculous and because she's getting treated for cancer she's bandaged up and they've done something doctor is not letting her fly back and uh Nathan has had this so I'm in the hospital then again with Nan for 34 days I think his guilt I don't know how much of a part it played in his stroke has to be something yeah but these all such coal yeah these are all such tiny tiny events in a SE sequence U it feels like all of our Lives We Believe are in the world out here but they're actually in our head so guilt is a big thing what's your relationship with God uh you went to these temples because your father would have liked it yeah not because you wanted to okay let me rephrase that but when you're at the temple uh what's your communication at that point wherever dad is let him be happy pray for that so you are speaking to somebody you are you believe that you're speaking to somebody so you believe in God I don't know this is a very uh fluid thing in my head at times when uh I've been asked this question I've said I don't know at times I've said yes uh like many others like myself I am guilty of using it as a crutch when something drastically bad or good happens in my life I suddenly have a belief in God and when life is so you don't thank God you're not grateful to when something good happens I'm very yeah like when something very bad or very good is happening I feel like I have three versions of answers for this I feel like I have a cynical answer I have a stoic answer I have a optimistic answer you believe in all three of them yeah let's see all of them yeah you tell me yours and give me a minute to think so so I grew up uh my father was extremely Pious he used to do two pujas a day we used to celebrate Diwali with a Puja we have Ganesh at a home for 5 days Ganesh in RK Studios for 10 days we celebrate every Festival we have navaras at home where we grow the kti and MAA so God was God was a very big thing growing up and um I think it made my uh U it gave a lot of peace to my father my mother was less religious uh less lesser than my dad but it made him happy so she used to do it so we as kids saw them like you said kids see their parents and try and emulate that um so I have a good feeling about God I don't have a I've never you know I I I realized very early on that my manifestation power is very strong if I ask something from God I was getting it too easily so at a very young age I stopped asking um because I said I'll save it for a rainy day you know um and I was very young when I when I was having this conversation with myself uh but I think since then I every night I say thank you God and I go to sleep uh so I have never ever asked God for something even when I'm in trouble even when like my mother's fighting with me and I don't have another conflicted conversation with her where she's going to cry and and stuff like that um or I want a film to succeed or I want to buy something I've never asked for that uh so my relationship with God is a lot of gratitude and you know I feel very very grateful for the place I'm in of everything that I have and so that kind of sums up my relationship with God I started believing a lot in the sanatan DH uh I think I started reading a lot about it in the last couple of years um I went quite deep into uh what it is what the effects are and see you believe it or you don't believe it if you believe it it's it's like hope it's like giving yourself um a good system you know good values uh now you could teach a child I'm giving an example of my child I could teach her values that I have kind of made up with my experiences or I can teach other values of what we all know what what God wants or expects us from and I think there's there's something good about it you know I I I feel uh when I say it for Puja I feel connected I feel um I feel there's some connection I feel good about myself the good energies I do yoga uh chanting every day uh for an hour um and when I'm hearing the the the mantras that my gurus reciting I feel good you know I believe it so I believe in God I feel I have been so lucky in life that it's unlikely if somebody did not like me uh but in organized religion I I find the hypocrisy so much that I don't know what to think about that like I'll give you an example I go to Temple sometimes whoever can afford it or some popular person or whatever who comes there cuts the line goes in people are waiting like I just don't it doesn't sit the entire thing doesn't sit well with me I'm like what is it because somebody has paid more money they get access somebody wise said this whatever is higher in your list of beliefs in that hierarchy is your god nice yeah so so then who you got then I'm trying to think of my list of beliefs work my mom my mother was a music teacher for her music is God what's yours thinking you can say it's work work is worship also so and wrong with it I don't know if work is it I don't know interesting concept though I have to like really have you ever spoken about God in any of your podcasts no no I haven't spoken about all of this in any of I've never because it's always like a subject right we're talking about uh AI or this or that this is more like life so I'm speaking a lot more about myself than I have ever what do you look up to it doesn't have to be a family anybody yeah so typically see I I grew up where I had these spikes in my life as where things worked for me in different spikes I feel like people who I considered my mentors on paper uh when I was growing up and I didn't have access to them when I met the in person and they became my friends and I had access to them like I have today M uh you start seeing that they're a bit like yourself as well and you realize okay I saw this facet which was exaggerated through that lens but he has his own flaws weaknesses positives advantages like me uh so the mentor menty thing somehow doesn't appeal to me in the manner like it once did but uh I like have you met Boren buff I have yeah what do you feel about him no no I think brilliant like all of these people Bill Gates Warren Buffet a lot of people or a lot of these people are brilliant in their own way but would I want to be like them in every way I don't know but there are facets of different people that I find appealing yeah do you like Michael Jordan yeah I like Michael Jordan you like Messi or Ronaldo I like Messi that's a very cliche thing to say because he seems like the nicer no you get no I listen I meet a lot of people who love Ronaldo really of course it's changed in the last one year post the World Cup but it was quite 50/50 before the World Cup are you hungry we eat also yeah we can eat har can we eat also yeah give us yeah what do you think is wrong with society today if you had to paint them in your lens what would you change I think judgment uh it could be any order but let me just start with judgment I think people are are too quick to judge um and I I and I'm seeing it in my own family members you know my own loved ones my own friends uh very easy to judge very easy to kind of pull someone down um building on I'll ask you a parallel question as well what do you think of men's mental health today in society there is a broad belief that men are not in society if there were 10 men 10 women 10 could go to war nine could die one would come back and society would propagate and it is not cool for men to play the victim card like it might be for women what do you think that does to male psychology well you know in the last few years times have been a little the thing is you can't comment so freely on this topic anymore you know because somebody he picks up something and that just becomes a trail of you being anti- feminist or being a male chauvinist so um I just feel for anybody if it's a man or a woman if they're not well mentally there's no shame in taking help um there is no shame in crying about it and the people who love you will understand it and the people who don't understand it don't love you so how does it matter um so it doesn't matter what people think do you think it's harder for ment to than is for women it is harder for men today that you're saying regarding mental health uh and to address it yeah 100% not just address it but there worse of then women if I were to cre Society on the mental health scale of 1 to 10 I don't know if it's worse for them uh listen women in this country are also really oppressed like really oppressed and and I'm I see it in the city like Mumbai so what happens in India we don't even know yeah uh so it' be very unfair to say that men is men are more and I think we both a bit Jaded by virtue of us around exactly right yeah I would I would feel that but I think uh uh I I have closed family close family members who are going through mental health problems and uh they're very open about taking help you know and my family is very supportive about them taking help and I think mental health is something that it's nice to kind of tackle it also uh quietly with a lot of Grace and not really don't use it as an excuse you know to not do things or not be a certain way um it's a problem find a solution keep working at it uh take love and care uh but don't make it an excuse right I think a lot of people make it an excuse yeah play the victim guard too easily so what happened in life beyond New York we can go back there so n i mean you know when I started I was always uh regarded as this Playboy guy who was just like dating actresses and let me tell you I was in New York for 3 years 9 months I didn't date one girl I didn't go on one date I was at what era was this this was from 2000 to 2003 why uh because I made myself believe I've always been an ashik so I made myself believe that my first girlfriend friend m in school when I left for New York even though I was not with her I made myself believe that that was my love of my life now it's over now let's just focus on work if she if things happen with her it happen but that's not and I think that mindset just made me uh not feel interested about anybody nobody um but yeah when I came back and I started working and then of course I I dated uh two very successful actresses and that just became my identity that he's a kasanova and I was labeled a cheater for a very large part of my U my life I still am uh you know it's one of those adjectives which pop up um bother you don't care no I don't care it used to bother me because it's not really entirely true uh people don't know the entire story and I would never ever speak uh about somebody like this in public because it's a very private thing uh but things were spoken about me uh and if it makes that person happy you know I I I I I don't have any uh any conflict with that person but uh it it used to bother me when I used to bother my parents so my parents used to open the papers and read about it and they were like what's happening so I I don't think they also got bothered I used to think that okay it's bothering them so it's bothering me but eventually I realized that listen I am just a commodity now I am accepted by the audience now people write good things about me bad things about me it's now it's just a commodity it doesn't matter so why am I taking myself to so seriously there are millions of problems which are way more important than me feeling bad about being written about uh and you believe in when you say romantic you believe in one woman forever I think that's the only way right I mean that's the only healthy way of living is because I wouldn't want my woman to be with somebody else so I won't be able to accept that so it's only fair that that person accepts uh expects the same from me mhm um yeah but uh yeah so I don't want to hurt the person I love I don't want to hurt Alia and I definitely don't want to hurt my daughter so I will definitely not do anything which will ever make them question me and you're romantic for prol long periods in life I think so I think yeah what is romance to you like how do you how do you like watching a movie laughing chatting you know I'm so lucky n that I married somebody who I'm extremely close to as a friend like we can really chat laugh you know like she's my best friend and I got very lucky with that um how is Alia as a person Alia is um is a wonderful person she's somebody who is uh she's got she's very colorful she's 11 years younger to me MH uh and when I met her she it's it's very funny the first time I met Alia was when she was 9 years old and I was 21 N I was 21 I was 20 years old and we did a photo shoot together for a movie sanila bansali wanted to make called balika Badu about child marriage uh so that's the first time I met her it seems a little uh weird now to you already in movies at 21 I was assisting bansali on black right uh so yeah he wanted to make a movie with me so he was dabbling in these different films so I did a photo shoot with Al and I still I had the photo shoot I'll show it to you um that's the first time I met her uh but Alia was somebody who I met over the years and I knew that this person is special I have immense respect for her as an actor as an artist as a person as a daughter as a sister and uh and she she really makes me smile you know I'm I'm very happy to go home to her I love going on a holiday with her but I love coming home with her also she is she in a good mood a lot of the times uh well she is a very ambitious girl and she's a overachiever like work is she's really passionate about her work extremely passionate extremely intelligent um so yeah this so she's she has spaces where she is kind of fragmented so you really have to get her attention but I think over the years me really cribbing to her about it I have her attention now and I'm talking like she listens to me you know so I think she's really made certain efforts uh and I must acknowledge this about her is that like everything I complained about or she complained about I think she made better efforts than I have she changed more for me than I have changed for her and I'm acknowledging it but I should do something about it so I should change a bit changed how she uh for example used to speak in a very loud tone and I think because of my father's tone growing up uh always kind of rattled um so she really made efforts to kind of change that and that's not easy when you've lived 30 years of your life speaking a certain way um you know she's someone who very instinctively react to If Raha falls down or she's like you know she's there's a reaction that kind of throws me off also you know so she makes certain things which uh put me at ease I hope I could say something that I did to put her at ease but I don't think I've done anything yet I did bake a cake with once on her birthday Harish what year was that what what cake did we bake for her sorry a milk cake yes yeah on a big yeah these were quoting honeymoon period years um have you been living together for a long time we've been living together since the first year that we started dating which was how long ago this is 2018 we started working on a film called brahmastra which Ayan made uh with the first thing we did on brahmastra we went to Tel Aviv to work with this MO coach called Ido portal and on the plane is when we started a romance so it was just that first day it was on um so yeah romance for me is just hanging out with her was together we were staying together she lives alone I live alone um so it just made sense they say that much time with one person suddenly can change everything like what happened in Co of living together oh it was the best time I should not say it but I had I really had good time with Alia like we were together for the entire lockdown and I I don't think we were frustrated with with each other we were being healthy we were training we were playing online Katan do you play Katan MH okay uh we learned poker um so we had a good time we we I think that really solidified our relationship and I think at the time when my father got sick she was really there you know she was there when I was in America when was some in the hospital if I was staying she was staying with me so she really she's really done a lot for me does that change I hear so many people in marriages how the how your partner is with your family is a game changer I've heard this from so many people I think so no it's because you love your family and another person who is an outsider is loving your family the way you love your family and that's something which even though if even if it's not real you know even if it's an effort still an effort because that kind of effort is not easy you know and to to continue doing it uh it's very rare that everything just falls into place now everyone just gets along so it's always an effort um my mother and Alia have a very good relationship uh they're very honest with each other more honest than I'm with my mother Al is with my mother and uh uh that makes me very happy you know because surrounded by women my mother my sister my sister's daughter now aliia Raha and they're just the best women in the world it's a lot of female energy around should we get the food and then continue [Music] going to join politics no never never why I feel like you know growing up I've been a Rebel Without a Cause kind of a thing politics requires for you to work in a certain structure and speak a certain narrative uh which you might or might not necessarily agree with MH and I don't see myself being happy in that kind of a role I don't think so that's that's actually the totally honest answer but you think this could change after 10 years the role or or your your your perception about what you think you feel about politics today I don't think so and I kind of like um I like my life the version of my life that I'm living today that you've created for yourself yeah yeah and I don't think I'm as badass as I would need to be for me to be a politician not today at least would you uh politics no I think I'm I would like to I like the world of being an artist creation I like that I would like to Die Trying creating things direct movies I know I'm not cut out to be a producer I tried producing one film called Jaga Jus which didn't do well at the box office at all uh but I realized that it's a skill set which I don't have and so it's very easy to says kind of successful in the field that you're in but everything requires a skill set and I definitely don't have a skill I'm not a people person so I think with politics you have to be a people person yeah so I'm not that for the entrepreneurs watching and who want to be in your industry what innate skill set does one need to be a producer a director a actor or any of the other roles in there so each you say an actor what it needs and producer what it needs one inherent trade I think in being a part of movies two things which I've realized is very important is patience very important a lot of people just want to just be successful and especially with social media you know that 15 minutes of fame and all of that but to really have a long career in in the Arts you have to have patience you know you have to wait um you have to have the quality of sacrifice you know you have to sacrifice something maybe your friendships or family life or a great lifestyle or travel something has to be sacrificed uh now if I take the professions to be a director you have to be extremely selfless and giving to be a producer you have to be a people person I think a producer is somebody who could be a politician because he's really getting this 200 people together uh and giving them a belief that we're going to create this and inspiring them and and making things happen and as an actor imagination you know childlike imagination don't let that run out don't become cynical and the question I asked you first as a guy or a girl how do you appear interesting in a room how do you walk into a room make an impression that leaves people wanting more you know n I've never had a problem with that because I don't want want to be noticed I'm that guy I I'm very happy if I'm not the most important person in the room if the three other actors were getting uh more attention than me I'm very happy as long as it doesn't come to me I'm the guy that you know when people used to say rule number 28 and you have to say present miss or Ria I us to stammer because I was like each time I call Domino's Pizza for a pizza and they ask me what's your name I had to say rir because I was so low on confidence mhm um so my confidence has become better M but I'm very happy not being the center of attention MH and handsome is what a handsome does yeah I mean if your work is good you know if your intention is is good uh your work ethic you know your that's what you need now what else do you need so you finished College in New York and then then uh I came back like I said my father said too much attention go back do something you're too young I was I must be like 2021 uh spent another year there time to come back when I came back every director in the film industry wanted to launch me but I was a big fan of sanj Lia bansali and I'm like every director wants to work with me why isn't San bansali offering me a movie so I was like maybe he's not aware of me so I went made a resume and sat outside his office um didn't tell him who I was whatever and I waited he was not there I left the resum I went home he called me the next day and he of course reading my name understood who I was and I told him I'm a big fan at D Das I just released at that time and I Lov D dasd big fan of that film and the first day when he met me he said that I want to make a film with you and so there was ambition was achieved right there uh but that one year or one and a half years I spent assisting on black with Mr bansali was at actually the biggest Film School of my life uh because a he was a very hard Taskmaster we were working 14 15 hours a day uh we were um I there were 10 other assistants and because I was who I was I was not um some special kid you know I was like everybody and he was um he was very short-tempered so we used to like face a lot of uh anger coming our way and I think that really hardened me it really uh prepared me for anything in life and then Savia happened uh which again was a very big disaster and in hindsight I also I'm very grateful that it didn't do well because that also prepared me for life you know so I had these two setbacks starting on um of course I was accepted as an actor MH in a way that okay this guy has potential maybe he'll do something mhm then I had bash which kind of just played onto that image of me being a Kasa because the character was that mhm uh but I think is that a bad thing I feel like this Casanova Thing Really Works well it's it's not about good thing or bad thing it's not the truth so again it was not a a perception that I was playing or a PR game I was playing it was just I was a new young kid right everybody was married and all the superstars and so they had to kind of ride about somebody so anyways then I think the the big film or the big moment of my life in my career was when I did a film called wake up Sid with Ayan it's the first time I met Ayan uh but then I realized that I remember on the third or fourth day I've spoken about this a lot but Ayan came to me after 3 four days of shoot and sat down and said that you're ruining my film because you're playing this part like a hero and this is a character and something just clicked you know like okay today in cinema you can play a character you don't need to always play the hero you don't always have to play that the quintessential hero uh and I think that really helped me in my next few years of the subjects I chose my father was always against the films I was doing he was like w upy Rockstar Rocket Singh um so he was he was not a big fan of these films M but and I know where he came from you know he was like listen India is a very big country and wake up city is not going to reach India it's going to reach your main cities maximum but if you would only want to be a Bonafide Star of India you got to be in more um commercial movies uh but then I realized that whenever I tried a commercial movie it never really worked out for me is because the intention was let's do something bigger the intention of believing in a story and character was always something which worked well for me and works well for anybody actually uh eventually you will only become a star or a superstar if you're a good actor you know if your work is good so I just focused on my work which movie was your dad proud of I think the first movie he was proud of was two movies one was a gazab Kahani which I shot simultaneously with wake upsid and which I at that time was looking down upon because wake UPS was this cool film with young filmmakers and you know young 80s with walkie-talkies and and a PR gazab Kahani was directed by Rajkumar Santos he's a very very perfect director but all the assistant directors were older than him but today I have so much of understanding of what the what the effect of that film is more than a wake up Sid so he was part of aab Kahani and there was another political film I did called rajti M uh I love that M yeah also I guess because these were big hits so that's why he he also liked them and then right after that that I remember when he saw like rockar and all he called me and said I don't think he got that film when he sawy said do some more popular movies jaani diani he didn't understand but he understood the success of it so he was very happy and then I guess when he saw Sanju he was very happy mhm uh these are the fil he liked I guess the commercial successful films I unfortunately did a very bad film with my parents called Bam um we all three were part of it but it was really a bad film MH so that was not a good experience whose opinion matters the most when a movie comes up see I always believe my mother is my biggest fan so she always like everything that I do uh my father was a little bit he became too cliche his opinion M to a point where he was so scared to watch my films I did a film called tamasha with imas Ali he didn't watch it because he thought it was too pseudo so he's like instead of me giving my opinion let me not watch the pseudo films only so that kind of fear was always there about what he would think about a movie um but no I think an audience's reaction has always been because it's it's see I'm in a I'm in a industry or an occupation where the result is but there's an immediate result correct you know you do a film and there's a result it's a hit or a flop it's a hit or a flop I've done a film called Rocket sing salesman of the year which was a big disaster there many people who come down there was such a wonderful film uh but the audience didn't like it and audience is King if audience doesn't like something means there's something wrong in the film otherwise there's no reason for them not to watch a film so I think the audience's validation it took me time to realize that but it's their validation or their opinion which matters the most to me so how many films done now I've been working since 16 years and I have had animal I think was my 20th release so which is not a lot of movies uh uh I should have been on my 40th film but most of my films take a lot of time so 20 films in 16 years they say whenever you get a lot of a good thing something else goes away something bad also happens successful in professional life I think you're at some kind of a peak today right like a bunch of stuff you've done has worked what has gone away it's come at the cost of what see the thing is I'm in this in a way in a service industry mhm I'm I'm providing entertainment and being in that industry I take it as an honor and not sacrifice so my I look at it that way I've sacrificed childhood friends I've sacrificed home life I've sacrificed a life I don't have a life I'm on a movie set or I'm preparing for a movie I'm now saying pre my daughter's birth that was my life um but it doesn't feel like a sacrifice because I genely love what I do I love being on a set I love I love acting M I love uh telling a story I've I'm sure there have been a lot of sacrifices but it doesn't feel like a sacrifice because if I had to go back I would still choose the same way what does it mean to be a superstar like what when you go somewhere and you see the reaction that you get what does it do not the Super icial thought but deep deep down what does it do for you and what will happen if it goes away of course it's the greatest feeling in the world you know and you get love you're receiving love you're receiving love from people who who you don't know you know they look at you and they smile at you and the eyes light up and that feeling is amazing but I can't get too attached to it and this of course I've realized very early on because I grew up in a film family and I've seen so much of successful people but at the same time I've seen so many failures my family has as generations of successful actors and failed actors so I know why the people failed I studied it you know from a very young age I was noticing everything I was noticing my father that he didn't like getting bothered and if a fan came to ask him for an autograph or a picture he very rudely turned to them and said no I'm not interested in doing that and I always sitting on the other side of the table looked at that Fan's face and that fans used to look at my father with so much of dis D and disappointment mhm that I was like listen I I don't I don't think I have the ability to say no to somebody if somebody wants to take a picture with me or take an autograph I'll be more than happy to do it so I don't take this job for granted I know what success is I know what failure is I'm very balanced about it I've anyways the person I am I the person I am I've never felt an extreme high and I don't feel extreme lows so if it's a successful film it's more like till the next one comes and if it's a failure like let's try harder again mhm you know it's been quite balanced that way if you had to say your top this helps me get to know you so much more as a person your top two highs of life and lows of Life uh my daughter's birth top second would be uh I mean my life you're saying are you saying what the feeling daughter's birth you know till the time she was born when Ari was pregnant you're imagining it right you don't what the feeling is she could feel it because uh baby's in her but when she was born and I was given her I was like first thing the doctor came and G me Raa it's not you can't describe it but if I had to describe it's like somebody's kind of taking a your heart out and just put it in your hand you know it's it's it's it's so it's instant it's the love of your life like oh it's it's too good yeah it's too good never felt that never feel never will feel that about anything or body in my life does the mother and father feel about it differently people say that the mother is connected at Birth the father takes 6 months 12 months to feel something yeah I think Raha considers Alia as a part of her so she doesn't consider Alia as another human like she they both are one but like with me she looks for like the musty and fun and and the laughter and and and flirting we are flirting all the time me and my daughter so any that was my top moment and I think the first moment would be again it's a little bit of a when I got the first form of attention mhm was when I scored a goal for my under 14 um tournament for school and when you scored a goal your name used to come in the newspaper m in times of India all the inter School matches Bombay Scottish Bombay Scottish and our team was really good we won couple of Cups uh we also played State and all uh so that was a very big moment and my mother made a cutting and I still kept it with her with these two moments come to mind lows uh what about yours H highest moments the lows are coming more easily than the highs I don't know why we get to lows but if you had to choose two highs I'm just getting a lot of lows I don't know why okay let's address the lows then let's wait for the highs to come lows were uh guilt around dad Le Brothers thing a little bit of a have you faced failure yeah yeah like the life of a investor bar Trader is the life where you fail 49 times out of 100 well fail you in a way that okay I don't think I'll be able to come back from this not in the recent bust but his yeah yeah I've gone like so when you're a Trader and you're starting off like you start with a small amount of money you trade you trade like mad right like you buy way out of the money options if you don't have enough Capital to do trading another way I'm talking like 19 20 years ago now um you build up you build up enough of a corpus over one year two years 3 years and then you lose it all in one day where you go bust I've had that happen a couple of times not in the last 13 14 years but before that and your second low point I'm regarding a brother and your father's yeah dog I think when my dog passed away what what breed was he boxer what was his name hobes he was with us yeah he was with us for 11 years hops H OES h o bbes Hobs and Calvin and Hobs like the comic but he was a he was not like a dog he was I don't know how to describe him but he emoted he knew this is when you were living with your parents this is when I used to go on and off see my parents I was not living with them but I would see them maybe every Sunday and still you felt so much of attachment yeah the dog was with them yeah the dog was with them that's crazy yeah it doesn't make sense though uh there's something about that dog he was not a dog he was like hope no he was just like he knew what you were feeling like boxers have that sad face you know they never like they have that droopy mouth thing happening and they have those big eyes you have a sad face yeah good way or bad people say I have a side fish yeah but there was something about him even now in my office in my cabin I have his picture cuz I don't know sometimes you come across dogs who are non dogs low point I think when when I go all in on a certain company I'm okay if it succeeds or fails but if I feel like there has been misrepresentation of some kind and I have allowed for myself to get swindled is a harsh word but carried away MH that troubles me relationships are hard uh breakups are worse I feel like one or two breakups are right up there uh it's hard when you're with somebody and you share so much love and after a point uh if they were to be angry uh I think that anger is tough to reason with those have been hard yeah I feel like whatever I cannot whatever I feel like I could control I had some power over or I could control my interaction with that event and I didn't do something about it those are the laws things that I can't control at all I'm not it's not in your control interesting my LS would be uh passing of my father and similar and second would be a heartbreak in one relationship of mine so two of that many but that's what comes to mind did you did you high point say no not coming huh come on High Point I have a very pessimistic Persona in life I rehash my flaws in my mind a lot more than the pluses in my mind like I'm my first critic to such an extent that when I have done when I have failed at something is significantly more Vivid In My Memory than when I have succeeded at something makes sense yeah in a way that should be that way you know if you want growth H it's conducive to growth I don't know if it's conducive to mental well-being overall so you're into tattoos little bit like one or two what does it say shalom peace in Hebrew so you just have one title uh this says be here now a book I read I had this tendency in life to procrastinate a lot I would be like what will happen in 10 years what will happen in 15 years there's this author called ramas he wrote a book about saying live today m M and not in the tomorrow or the yesterday and at that point it resonated with me a fair bit and I got this will you have any I just got one my daughter uh I always wanted it but never found anything meaningful what would you do if you weren't afraid if I weren't afraid of anything no fear whatsoever of judgment Society family all of that so saying show version of yourself that you have afraid of something about you uh I don't know man I don't know what my insecurities are also like will I will I be in a lot of pain and and anguish if my movies stop doing well and I don't get opportunities um money has never been a driving force I I really go by uh this one line I read I think it was G GK Krishna morti I said it jitu jitu jidu Krishna J Krishna morti I said I don't know the exact code but it goes something like you see the reason why I'm happy is that I don't mind what happens MH so I don't mind like if I'm in pain if I'm feeling sad I will feel sad and I don't question it I'll go through the Beats of it if I'm happy I'll go through the Beats of it so I don't mind it it's fine you know and I really believe in that philosophy jidu is brilliant by the way I I love him do you feel you live a life of contradiction like he speaks of like of course we all do we all do what is the contradiction in your life especially when you're in a marriage you know you have to let go of your personality you know and sure she is also learning go of her personality be kind of adjusting to each other trying to uh make it livable for each other any marriage is doing that so you have to let go and you have to adjust and you have to sacrifice facets of him because it's impossible for two people to like each other the way they are so what is the ultimate Drive in life right now if you were to be given a wish unrelated to family a professional wish a professional or a personal wish unrelated to family if ranir today can wish for one thing what would it be I'll wish for my father to come back so I can spend more time with him uh speak to him have conversations with him do your parents like does your dad show up in your life in your personality like do you often do something and feel like this is so like my dad yeah I think so now I'm feeling that you know certain things like how he used to yawn a yawn he makes a certain sound so there are a lot of things that that I started believing that I I emulate him uh but I'm my personality is more like my mother's you know she's being with someone who's very calm and M and happy and you know so it's more like like who are your friends like if you were to name your three four best friends so my uh I have two best friends one is a new one aan um who I met during wake up said and there's another guy called Rohit davan um who David davan Son davan's brother he's a director himself he's a close friend of mine so Rohit is that guy who I call to have mindless conversations with uh Ayan is a little bit of a moral compass uh you know we both uh have certain ideologies and and and and a vision for how we what we need to do as as filmmakers or actors and we share that philosophy um so we're kind of in ways pushing each other to reach that you know if something's doing anything wrong um make sure you say it like it is and don't foot it and what is your ideology R's ideology of life I think honest good work uh original um and I think it's misconstrued here but acting and making a movie takes a lot of effort it's not just glamorous you know it's not just driving a sports car like Romancing you know heroin you know it's it's it's a lot of hard work uh so to continuously do that for a long period of time U it's very hard I I know Mr Amir Khan when I meet him now and and I met him two years back and he he was in tears so what happened he's like I've spent 30 years of my life and my only relationship I have is with my audience I don't have a relationship with my children I don't have a relationship with my mother with his ex-wife who was his wife then and that's what this profession takes you know you have to you have to give it all M uh so the Endeavor is also to kind of balance a re a your real life with your real life and not get swayed by just ambition you know um I don't want to get swayed by ambition right of the three KH uh I'm guessing there's significantly senior what do you think if you had to like pick one thing from each of them what would you pick interesting question uh we'll start with Amir Khan his uh work ethic I've seen him at work and it's it's it's a lot of work you know his work ethic is just amazing labor you know he's laborous and and he does the work Shah ruk Khan for his um his giving nature he talk to you and he will make you feel that you're the only person in the world yeah and I've seen him do that to every person he speaks to and initially I tried doing it it's not possible yeah what is he doing what is he capturing that is working so well cuz I feel the same way like I feel like he's giving and when you're giving people take they receive giving in terms of attention he's giving he's giving himself this is a piece of me and even if he's not there he's still giving you know and or didn't cease that effort shuk Khan after so many years where he is in life to still give um it's really admirable and Salman Khan for his um a lot of things I admire about Salan Khan actually I don't speak about it often um there is a mischi childlike quality in Salan which is not g way you know U lot of people who don't know him uh can get confused that he's trying to bully you or something but um he's got a childlike quality thank you it's an interesting bottle is this camel black what is that Camel black shoot it's a bottle of oh the brand camel back okay they make decent bottles if you had to term this chapter of your life something like these two years of your life what would the chapter be called wow chapter do you have an answer for yourself what next what next so you say what next is because it's not enough because I feel like and I need more I need to achieve more I need to SP like spread my wings wider I need to reach out more I feel feel like I'm transitioning from a very stock market heavy role MH to a very longer term investor kind of role MH uh I'm actually enjoying that like each time I invest in a new industry today it could be any industry right it could be like clothes it could be consumer it could be coffee it could be manufacturing it could be EV it gives me a I to walk into a completely new field where I know nothing and then be thought and uh when you give somebody a check do you feel arrogant about it no no you don't feel arrant not at all the opposite I feel like once somebody has taken a check they have the right to be Arrogant with you which is often the case cuz they're nice n com is is is investing in the company it is a big deal for them no also very uh consciously people are nicer to you before they get funded not after right but that process of working with new Industries I find very accelerating like and deep down I have learned one fact of my life is learning alleviates anxiety and validates me there's something about learning like I might not be paying attention to the book in my hand I might not be capturing any of what it says but having it in front of my face for an hour before I go to bed makes me feel better about myself it it's not the book it's the act of the act of even attempting to learn alleviates anxiety for me prya you spend your money yeah I spend money holidays and TR yeah holidays travel cars properties not see I'm not uh a paint or anything like that properties no uh I rent this house I rent my house in Bangalore you don't believe in investing I'm not a fan I feel like rental yields on residential real estate in India are 3% if I'm able to utilize a property at 3% I would it would be farfetched for me I mean the the rate of borrowing in society today is 10 11% even after you made so much of money it's it's what are you going to do with so much money after you die it's not that that I just feel like I'm getting a deal when I'm renting versus buying I feel like there's no emotional thing that I want to own a home no no never uh cars no like I have cars uh I'm are you fond of cars like sports cars no I don't have I don't have any Ferraris or Lamborghinis or any of that but I have nice cars I have like whatever BMW Mar stuff like that but I don't have let me put it this way I don't have anything that somebody on the street would turn around and take pictures of are you into art yeah Indian art Indian art favorite Indian artist Souza Souza you have a Souza here no don't don't have much art here uh little bit more in Bangalore okay who else I'm not talking about the master if you talking about like any there's a new guy I have outside called ano gundu okay African no no Indian from Hyderabad he used to paint footpath and sign boards somebody sent him to art school and now he's become like a really big artist what's his name again anund I like P the Polish guy I have a whole bunch of his I have like 20 paintings of his here nice uh I like vundam a little bit I like gundi I like jinoy I like T meta Indian artists I think are growing uh I think the Indian art scene has slightly lagged behind because we always painted in 2D in a way mhm Western Art was more three-dimensional in nature uh but I think a lot of new people are really picking up i' I'd love to do something in art and I don't know what are you envious about anything uh I'm not envious about anything in particular but I know how big a part Envy has played in my own life okay your journey so far yeah yeah I feel like who you envious about of circumstances uh young can't afford a certain thing want to work doubly hard in order to obtain that is at at the bottom of it like the core feeling is Envy it's jealousy it's insecurity I think Society misrepresents insecurity to be a bad thing uh insecurity in my opinion leading to inaction is a Bad Thing insecurity leading to action is generally conducive to a world governed by capitalism for sure what are you insecure about today see I'm really not insecure about my work you know I don't know if that's arrogance if it's like too much of self-confidence if it's in the place I'm in in my life where I am so I don't feel insecure about it now maybe tomorrow if everything snatched away from me I can't imagine that I do have a lot of faith in my in my art um um it's been a while since I've been in Secure M you know I've I don't like feel insecure if like if I see Alia Romancing another guy on screen maybe like 10 years back I would feel that uh but I've grown up I've understood life a bit you know yeah um I'm really interested to know about your relationship with our prime minister like like M have you are you friendly with him do you can you like pick up the phone and call him no somebody told you not to say anything no can I pick up the phone and call him no uh have I had the privilege of he's very fond of you I don't know about that I feel like that's what that's what we he about like he's very fond of what you've done what you achieved I I I don't know I feel like I've had the privilege of being around him at a couple of events and uh I think people read into that but like I I respect him I admire him and uh I feel like I'll give you a story once we were in the US uh there was three four of us with him back yeah one year back or something like that and uh we were in Washington uh for 3 4 days and you were traveling with him or on your own no no I went there on my own but he was there and he would do a speaking session with us in a room uh with some American businessmen and all of that at 8:00 a.m. in the morning he would go give a speech somewhere at 11:00 a.m. then he would go sit in like the vice president something at 1: p.m. 2 p.m. he would do something else at 400 p.m. something else at 700 p.m. something else at 11:00 p.m. and at 8: 9 in the evening I was out like you know I was like okay I'm tired after 2 days I'm feeling sick he was then going to Egypt to do the same thing all over again I think his his energy at his age and yeah it's there's a lot to learn I feel like there's a lot to learn from everybody and there is definitely so much to learn from him and I feel like uh privileged to have had uh C such Close Quarter yeah yeah there's a lot to learn from him but no I don't think he would pick up my phone nor do I have his phone number should we try nor his nor is there any uh such kind of a thing no yeah I wish honestly I wish they were but there isn't the leader of of the country and I am just me it yeah what about you what do you think of politics what do I think about politics I don't really need to think much but I know that when I met uh a prime minister all of us went to meet him four or five years back couple of young actors and directors that's the of course you see him on television and you see how he talks he's a great orator but I remember the moment that we were sitting and he walked in and he got this magnetic charm about himself and he came and he sat down and he spoke to each person something so personal like my father was going to treatment that time so he was asking how the treatment is going and what's happening and all of that you was talking to Alia about something else Vicky kosha about something else Karan about like everything was very personal um and that kind of effort you seen Great Men yeah you know when they put that effort it doesn't need to yeah uh we SP shuk Khan yeah um and the many the many Achievers who put in that effort and uh that says a lot about that person yeah he has Aura for sure and it's a tough job being a politician not just him I think for every politician out there uh we we see one side of it but I think to be in their shoes is very it's very hard super hard man I would not give up my shoes to be in those shoes that's why when you asked me earlier politics I said no chance I like my shoes uh is there reason that you have your initials on your slippers yeah so uh like I was telling you earlier uh I feel like craftsmans ship Indian Brands making it big abroad I'm I'm being like uh totally for that uh this is a local Indian brand which has access to the best kind of leather the best kind of craftsmanship you can find MH they cost maybe like 10,000 bucks to make they feel 10,000 rupees yeah is is that a lot no it's not to to like a cost price of a no no they sell it to me for that much I don't know how much they're actually but they feel better than a foreign brand like Gucci or LV any and you can actually feel the leather and compare I feel like there is there are so many options like this in India I this is this is already in Market yeah yeah what's it called This is called curo c o and where is the brand from you know how I found them on Instagram like it just sponsored thinking independent Indian shoe makers they didn't even make chaples so Instagram's kind of listening to us so it will pop up right so I don't but I think this is the way forward like subco the coffee brand I just invested in them I feel like their coffee is better than other countries coffee have you tried it yeah of course yeah but I think subco has potential outside I feel like these guys have potential there's a brand I'm looking at haven't invested yet called 1111 which makes shirts using Kara bani crazy good designs again Indian independent there and there are so many of these blossoming Brands I feel like it's such a easy switch what you what novelty are you getting buying a Gucci t-shirt or a Balenciaga Shoe Society yeah and here like you know somebody has spent 20 hours using their hand and making something the fabric is significantly better the leather is significantly better the coffee is significantly better I feel like if we all were to switch a little bit like that net net result would come back and help us in our own way CU you will build something right you start a sneaker brand tomorrow I'll start something you'll buy more of me I'll buy more of you netn net helps the ecosystem yeah so the chapel is a product of that and I don't think it's what are the three Health hacks that you've discovered all these years and you think it's really help I think sleep sleep is the number one and you're not a afternoon Apper or a can you nap in the afternoon I can if I try I'm sure but doesn't happen very often okay I try and break my day up in a way that 8 8:30 in the morning till 3:34 I'm stuck with stock markets I typically try and go to the gym at 4: work out till 5: and then do meetings and the investing stuff and all that so you have a long day of work but it doesn't feel like that a lot of So when you say you're seven hours you're doing stock market so you're just in front TV on the phone uh in front of computers not on the you're not on the phone no most of my conversations with my colleagues is on chat okay what app do you use uh Google Google yeah so we use Google Mail Google Drive Google Chat everything's on Google okay so sleep is one then what am I having actively Omega 3 yeah everybody seems to think there is something in that and you think cold showers ice baths I want to uh I tried it like I'm trying to like put ice by Ice put it in the bathtub and then try it but I'm lasting like 40 seconds or something bad have you done cryotherapy I've tried you must work out like proper prop you know I've because of this this uh new project that I'm going to start soon I I've really changed uh my style of workout because before it was like dumbbells and pushing and chest press and you know protein and all of that I'm working with this uh uh really interesting trainer he's from Korea his name is nam his name is nam um and he's really holistically changed my my perception of training I train with him three hours a day in the morning I do mobility and stretching and cardio uh from 11: to 12: uh I'll I'll sleep in the afternoon for an hour and then I'll train from 5 to 7 and that's usually strength but I'm I'm doing such new things and which has nothing to do with machines or weights you know it's body weight it's a lot of pull-ups a lot of squats lot of deadlifts that's the only weight I use otherwise U lot of of new style of training you know handstands headstands um so I'm I'm I'm enjoying you know I'm bored of just pumping three hours a day is a lot it is a lot but I'm doing it because I'm preparing for a role what is the role uh they haven't announced the film yet so I I don't want to say it uh but it is um definitely the most challenging part that that I could get um it requires a lot of um requires another level of I wouldn't say method but preparation which I've been preparing actually since the last seven months wow I haven't show a movie since eight months actually so this has been like a paternity leave for me um who do you think if you were to categorize somebody as competition you really look up to in Bollywood who would it be uh so my age group are below me right I wouldn't say the KH or because um though when I started I was like am my competition why should I say you know the new guys um they're such fine actors I Vicky Kel's work a lot ranir Singh um yeah you know it's it's the opportunity and the film I've realized that you know you have a an actor which you don't quite appreciate right now but him in a right film at the right time I'll just change it for you uh but as of right now two actors that are really like is wikii Kell ranir Singh uh and I like Karthik also you know I think Karthik has something very Charming on screen you know he's he's got a Charming personality is it tough to be in a profession where you way get the result of a lot of work on one particular day like you put in one year of work two years of work span of 10 seconds right you know waste of time like super film onto life you know it's just that uh so that's why I say always B onto the next because you cannot take that seriously it's a lot of work for one year we are making this film like we are saving the world you know that kind of intention uh but the result is and I've seen it break people man like being a part of movies is an industry of manyi heartbreaks because your heart is it's about three or four films work in a year right and usually one surprise film or the big ones you know 304 out of 30 40 I would say out of 80 you know 80 90 so 5% success yeah uh whoever has come into the movies they always lose money yeah can you make money in movies not as an actor but as a person coming from outside I think the new corporate system of of of of financing films and owning IP is also uh is also being a game changer now because of Ott because of social media so IP is a big game right now um as it is everywhere uh but yeah I think if you have the Lion Share if you finance a film you will make money uh but if you're just a producer who just taking money and making a film you don't want to make much money right you it's very hard yeah I feel like I meet so many people who are investing in movies how many of them actually make money when you ask them it's just a passion thing you know yeah that's what they just want to be part of the movies you know I feel like it's tough to compete with businesses where people are doing it for passion I believe the same in restaurants very hard to make money in restaurants yeah passion any closing thoughts this has truly been um you know you feel it happens to me you know sometimes when I'm when I'm acting and you're very tired and you give a shot and you've really given something from inside and you're not aware of what you said and you go home and you wonder what did I say but something has left you in some way so you feel a little weak and drowsy so I'm feeling a little weak and drowsy I hope you've not spoken rubbish but um I mean it's it's really an honor to be around you to speak to you and um you showing so much of Interest towards me my work and my my my life um it's been a pleasure thank you m thank you so much for coming and uh we'd love to see more of you we'll figure out how we can do it we'll tell you uh topics that might resonate with you so we can start the conversation here but over the years we'll do a lot more done thank you so much thank you guys thank you all thanks [Music] all I think we've done 3 hours are you serious yeah yeah like cut it [Music]