Struggle and strife are not strangers for actors trying their luck in Bollywood. However, the struggling phase seemed unusually long for someone as incredibly good-looking as Arjun Rampal.
Arjun Rampal confesses to Shubha Shetty-Saha that it was only after he ‘accepted’ himself that did things began ‘rocking’ for him
Struggle and strife are not strangers for actors trying their luck in Bollywood. However, the struggling phase seemed unusually long for someone as incredibly good-looking as Arjun Rampal. To top that Arjun had also given up a lucrative modelling career for tinsel dreams.
Eleven long years of struggle and his acting career was almost written off till Don and Om Shanti Om resurrected him. Moreover, his performance in Rock On has pushed Arjun in the big league. Happy with his newfound success but not one to forget those days of ‘waiting’ Arjun recalls, “That phase is scary. You can sense life passing by without you having achieved anything. It is a very frustrating period. But you can’t do anything about it.”
Arjun could have easily compromised but chose not to. “It is a tough choice to make especially when you have children and family. But you need to have the belief and faith to wait. The more you compromise, the more unhappy you will be. When you have nothing to fall back on, you grab the first thing that comes your way. I had decided not to do that, whatever happens,” Arjun reveals.
“Once the good times roll in, we tend to forget the bad times and start taking things for granted. But if you go through really tough times like I have, it teaches you not to take anything for granted,” he adds.
Arjun feels that the timing was not right when he got into acting way back in 1997. “I found most things happening in Bollywood cheesy. There were heroes wearing baggy pants up above their waist. I couldn’t really do those things,” he laughs adding, “I didn’t understand the medium one bit and I had this sword dangling over me that ‘models can’t act’.”
Even though he acted in a few films, nothing made a dent. “My grandchildren would have given me a tapli if I had to show them the work I did,” he jests.
Fortunately, Don happened. The change, he says, came about when he started accepting himself. “I understood that I should stop pleasing people. When you are not doing well, people sideline you and you are pushed into anonymity.”
But Arjun has no regrets. “I have seen the rough side. I am glad I did. I now understand that when somebody needs a helping hand, you must help. People’s opinions really don’t matter because they keep changing according to your position.”
Today Arjun’s truly rocking…. just like his character Joe in Rock On. “I was the only one who cried while reading the script. I could understand what Joe was going through,” he ends.
s_shetty@dnaindia.net
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