It’s an open buffet for Manoj Bajpayee fans. The actor is flexing his funny bones on OTT with Inspector Zende, a more goofy than gritty film about the capture of a serial killer. In theatres, he is more somber, playing a man looking for answers in Raam Reddy’s magical extravaganza, Jugnuma. On the cards is also Police Station Mein Bhoot, a horror-comedy from the house of Ram Gopal Varma, and before the year ends, we will hopefully get to see him as the commoner spymaster in Family Man season 3. Manoj somehow manages to do it all.
In this freewheeling conversation, we speak to him about his love for indie films, his existential crisis, the success of Saiyaara, reuniting with Ram Gopal Varma, and why he would want to learn Malayalam.
You might be the only actor who is able to balance well. An indie project always seeps in between your more commercial commitments. A lot of actors talk about “one for me, four for them,” but once swallowed by the big Bollywood machinery, they are unable to. How do you do it?
There are two things. Firstly, my love for indie films is immense. I feel that it serves cinema far more. Secondly, if you are ready to go for a pay cut and are not insecure about the fact that the cheque amount might not be as much as you get from other films, just go ahead and do it. I need one or two indie projects going for me every year for my own evolution as an actor. It is a conscious effort to level yourself and work in collaboration with other people on the set, merely as an actor. It’s a reality check I like to give to myself.
In the beginning of your career, was it a conscious effort not to go the commercial way? Because that would have maybe come in the way of you doing more content-driven work?
Yes. After Satya (1998), I would have easily gone the other way. In fact, during that time, I was in a very unsure space. Parallel cinema had taken a dent after Shyam Benegal and Govind Nihalani started working less, and those were the kind of filmmakers I wanted to work with. I had no space in mainstream films. I was only being offered villain roles, which didn’t interest me. I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I was refusing offers from big production houses, which were offering big money, and as a result, I was only offending people.
Must be tough to say no at that time…
Oh, very much. The commercial space is filled with filmmakers with a feudal mindset. Saying no to them was like committing hara-kiri (suicide).
You have often spoken about how working in independent projects arms you with skills you can use in mainstream films. But is it ever the other way round? Is there anything the indie space can learn from its commercial counterparts?
The mainstream guys always study the market, something that the indie filmmakers are completely oblivious to or reluctant to learn about. They should not be. When you are making a film, you should know how to take it to the people. The only filmmaker who can do that is Anurag Kashyap, and that is why he could make a difference. He didn’t fall for that mainstream world, but he learnt from them and made an effort to understand the market.
Anurag, I feel, is a good blend. An arthouse guy who has grown up on the big screen, mass cinema….
(laughs) Yeah. Actually, all of us are cinephiles who started with Amitabh Bachchan and ended with Naseeruddin Shah.
Talk to me about Jugnuma, it might be the most stunning film I have seen in a long time…
It’s because we shot it on 16mm film, which gives it this nice, grainy, nostalgic look. Raam Reddy is a passionate filmmaker. I was so looking forward to shooting this film because when I read the script, I was in the same state of mind as my protagonist is in the film. The seeking, the questions, they were all the same.
What kind of questions?
Oh, (sighs). All those existential ones.
Were you going through an existential crisis?
Yes. So much so that I wanted to get out of this city and this industry.
Why is that? Were you not getting the kind of films you wanted to do?
No, my commercial projects were actually doing well. I don’t know, this seeking feeling, I have had since childhood. It resurfaces once in a while. It’s just that this time it came much stronger. For one year, I wasn’t doing any work. I was just looking after my health, spending time with my family, reading, and watching films. That is when this film came to me, and for some reaso,n I immediately connected to Dev (the protagonist).
I feel like in recent times, there has been a line drawn between mainstream entertainers and content-driven indie films. In the process, the middle-of-the-road cinema has reduced. How do you look at all this?
I think post-Covid, theatres died down, and in the process of reviving it, we started making marvels. Our own franchises, universes, stuff like that. We were inundated with the larger-than-life action films. One or two of them worked, and because we have this herd mentality, we started making more of those, and now that Saiyaara is a hit, I don’t know how many romantic films will start coming up (laughs).
Producers might be calling writers, asking about romance scripts idling around…
None of those scripts is ever coming my way, though (laughs).
But horror-comedy is coming your way. You are reuniting with Ram Gopal Varma after about two decades with Police Station Mein Bhoot. How would you describe Ramu 2.0?
Like a kid in a candy store. I think he is much more evolved, much more with his own self. He has finally found his being. That man has reinvented himself, both as a human being and a filmmaker.
Do you ever ask yourself what's next? Is there a kind of film or a kind of role you have the desire to do?
I don’t have that kind of a wishlist. But yes, I would like to take up roles that are more and more challenging. Apart from films, there are two things I want to do: learn to play the harmonium and another language.
Which one?
French and Malayalam.
Two languages in which great cinema is made. Want to watch them without subtitles?
(laughs) Yeah. That’s the plan.