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Then just as I am walking in he looks up and smiles a hello and it hits many of us — oh, it’s Nawaz! He is that aggressive inspector Khan in Sujoy Ghosh’s Kahaani (2012), the drugged-out Faizal Khan in Anurag Kashyap’s Gangs of Wasseypur (2012) or Rakesh the reporter who discovers his conscience in Anusha Rizvi’s Peepli Live (2010) among other characters.
That, perhaps, is Siddiqui’s most startling quality. He is this short, dark, nondescript looking guy in real life — like the hundreds of people you might see on a bus or train but never remember. But on screen, “he brings an amazing authenticity, he becomes the character. And therefore he doesn’t get recognised as Nawaz, only as a character,” thinks Khan. He had given a desperately struggling Siddiqui a cameo in New York (2009) that got noticed. Khan had then promised Siddiqui that whenever he had a suitable role he would come back to him. By the time he was writing Bajrangi Bhaijaan, Siddiqui had already hit big time. He is now referred to as one of the most brilliant actors India has produced not just by Indian critics, but by the global cinema community.
The late Roger Ebert, American film critic and cult figure of sorts, invited Siddiqui to the week-long Ebertfest, his annual film festival in Chicago after watching Prashant Bhargava’s Patang in 2012. It was, arguably, the only Indian film screened there. Ashim Ahluwalia’s Miss Lovely (2012), where Siddiqui plays a sleazy producer of C-grade films, made it to the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival in 2012. It has been screened at almost every major film festival since. It was also the year India discovered him — he was awarded the Special Jury Award at the National Film Awards for his work in Kahaani, Gangs of Wasseypur, Talaash (2012) and Dekh Indian Circus (2011).
Siddiqui settles down for the hour-long chat rolling his own cigarette. We speak (largely) in Hindi about an earlier meeting in Delhi some months ago when he mentioned that the only time his heartbeat is normal is when he faces the camera. He is afraid of interviews and being asked some “bhaari bharkam (heavy) intellectual sawaal (question).”
What is the big worry now, post success? The struggle to choose the right film, says he. “If you destroy the instinct that brought you here, you are lost.” He thinks for a bit and adds, “The craft, the preparation I have to use as an actor in Bajrangi Bhaijaan is the same as in Miss Lovely, only the role, the characters are different.” Throughout the interview the only questions that truly get him going are the ones on acting — its theory, its craft, its technique — with an intensity that is overwhelming at times.
That is why his rather eclectic choice of films is the second startling fact about Siddiqui. So there is Kick (2012) and Bajrangi Bhaijaan (2015) — popular mass films with Salman Khan. There is Sriram Raghavan’s well-received Badlapur (2015) with Varun Dhawan, one of the most profitable films of 2015. But some of his offbeat films — Patang, Miss Lovely, Liar’s Dice (2014) and Black Friday (2004) — have not been watched by most Indians.
In the seventies and eighties, Patang or Miss Lovely would have been called ‘art films’, now they are a wonderful display of storytelling by film makers who dare to do what they want as the Indian film industry goes through the biggest transformation it has seen in five decades. Siddiqui reckons that in this time of “reshuffling and mixing of genres, ideas” — actors like him who don’t have looks or pedigree stand a chance.
They did not when the impoverished National School of Drama (NSD) graduate landed in Mumbai in the late nineties. He had already spent several years in Delhi, trying to pursue his dream of theatre, living off tea and Parle G biscuits for days on end. But he just couldn’t make ends meet. And he certainly did not want to go back to his big joint family of 85 people in Budhana.
Why did a young man who had helped his father on the sugarcane and wheat farm till his teen years and who had not seen too many films want to act?
It is one of those quirks of fate. The first time Siddiqui saw a play, with a friend in Delhi, he was mesmerised by the chemistry between the audience and the actors. “It inspired me, there is no recommendation, no corruption. Acting is a nude art, whatever you are, the audience can see it. In other professions you could fool people,” he says. Then he saw lots of plays before joining NSD in 1993. It is an experience that helps one, “find out yourself, what you are,” says Siddiqui.
How did he cope without English? “English is just a language, it is not a measure of intelligence,” he says. There is no overt bitterness or sarcasm in Siddiqui but his eyes twinkle with mischief as he tells me, “In the US and other countries where I have travelled, I have spoken in English without translators and everybody has understood what I say.” The story is different in India. At NSD, teachers routinely rejected his Hindi answers and accepted the same when they were offered by others in English. Siddiqui simply learnt to deal with it. Just like he learnt to deal with rejection from film and TV for 10 long years in Mumbai — much of it based on his looks. Till 2012 happened, Siddiqui was resigned to doing bit roles and acting workshops.
Those years are now proving to be priceless. “Bahut khaali time tha, bahut experiences hue (I was free, I had many experiences). During that time I observed people, subconsciously,” says he. One of his favourite techniques both in Delhi and Mumbai was to become another person and see people’s reactions. For three years he pretended to be a blind man every time he went to his barber in Delhi. Sometimes he would play mute or just behave absurdly to see reactions. It is hundreds of those internalised experiences that he draws upon in this super hectic phase. “In films you are constantly caught up in the storytelling and then shooting, there is no time to get detached and see how you are doing, you are only working,” says he.
Why not take a break to digest his success? He doesn’t even pause before answering, “I have been without work for 10 years, now I want to work for 10 years.”
It is one of those quirks of fate. The first time Siddiqui saw a play, with a friend in Delhi, he was mesmerised by the chemistry between the audience and the actors. “It inspired me, there is no recommendation, no corruption. Acting is a nude art, whatever you are, the audience can see it. In other professions you could fool people,” he says. Then he saw lots of plays before joining NSD in 1993. It is an experience that helps one, “find out yourself, what you are,” says Siddiqui.
How did he cope without English? “English is just a language, it is not a measure of intelligence,” he says. There is no overt bitterness or sarcasm in Siddiqui but his eyes twinkle with mischief as he tells me, “In the US and other countries where I have travelled, I have spoken in English without translators and everybody has understood what I say.” The story is different in India. At NSD, teachers routinely rejected his Hindi answers and accepted the same when they were offered by others in English. Siddiqui simply learnt to deal with it. Just like he learnt to deal with rejection from film and TV for 10 long years in Mumbai — much of it based on his looks. Till 2012 happened, Siddiqui was resigned to doing bit roles and acting workshops.
Those years are now proving to be priceless. “Bahut khaali time tha, bahut experiences hue (I was free, I had many experiences). During that time I observed people, subconsciously,” says he. One of his favourite techniques both in Delhi and Mumbai was to become another person and see people’s reactions. For three years he pretended to be a blind man every time he went to his barber in Delhi. Sometimes he would play mute or just behave absurdly to see reactions. It is hundreds of those internalised experiences that he draws upon in this super hectic phase. “In films you are constantly caught up in the storytelling and then shooting, there is no time to get detached and see how you are doing, you are only working,” says he.
Why not take a break to digest his success? He doesn’t even pause before answering, “I have been without work for 10 years, now I want to work for 10 years.”
