Top 97 Quotes & Sayings by Rajkummar Rao

I don't think that now I am a star. I don't get too much time to interact with people, and I am quite busy with work. I work. I come back home, and my loved ones are still the same. They will never change. And, I travel. I have not realised or internalised that life has changed.

'Newton' has given a lot to our cinema.

After my schooling, I started theatre. By the time I graduated, I was doing theatre 24x7. Luckily, the FTII (Film and Television Institute of India) acting course started.

Acting, for me, is giving to your co-actors.

I don't know when I'll ever get a chance to be all alone in a film.

'Newton' is a very Indian film but resonates with people all across. And that's the reason it got great response at the film festivals.

People are falling in love with characters now, and that is why writers are creating such stories. I am really happy that such stories are getting prominence.

When I was in Class Four, I wanted to be an astronaut. I am still fascinated with the universe. I decided I wanted to be an actor when I was in Class Eight.

I am the same person who came to this city Mumbai a few years ago to act in Hindi films, and I am just continuing doing that. I did not change as a person. All that happens is people change around me.

In Delhi, I became a serious stage actor. Then, luckily, the FTII acting course began, and I studied there, spent some time working on my craft. In 2008, I moved to Mumbai, and then in one and a half years of so-called struggle, I got my first film, 'Love Sex aur Dhokha' (LSD).

There are a lot of things people are calling me, and I'm overwhelmed. I have a lot of gratitude, but I just want to keep doing what I'm in love with, which is acting.

I don't know how my body would react if I don't eat for 10 days. In order to go through that experience, I almost did not eat or drink water for 15-20 days. I only had one carrot a day, a cup of black coffee, and a few sips of water.

'Stree' is something fresh and new. Audiences want to see different kind of content on-screen, and 'Stree' is exactly that. It is a unique genre - horror-comedy - which has not been explored much in our country.

I want to go higher in my career. This is not my best. My best is yet to come.

When you are successful, the perception of the people around you changes. If I do a variety of work, people notice me differently, and that is what is happening. I am fortunate to get these opportunities.

In 'Stree', I had a great time working with the whole team and Dinu, being the producer and one of the most important people. And now we are doing another film together, and I'm sure there will be a couple of more films in the future.

When Raj and DK came and narrated me the script, the title was something else. But in conversation, I told them if we can name it 'Stree'. In a way, I was the one who decided the title. I found that one word very catchy.

I think God made this very path for me, and he guided me all throughout. And my family has always been very supportive. It's not like one day I sat across the dinner table and told them I want to be an actor. It didn't happen like that.

People claim that no good actors came out of FTII after Naseeruddin Shah and Shabana Azmi. What they don't know is that the acting course was closed for 26 years and reopened only in 2004.

I feel since people have started noticing me and enjoying my performance, and considering the kind of love I've got in 2017-18, many feel that I have arrived, because there's a belief that I can probably carry a film on my shoulders now.

It is not that I am only looking at doing biopics. But of course, as an actor, I always love portraying real-life characters because there is so much challenge involved in recreating somebody's life.

Building a character - nothing gives me more high than the process of exploring someone else's life on screen.

It's very tough for someone who doesn't have a filmi background to get work in Bollywood. It's not a smooth ride unless you are really lucky. But I think one has to be prepared for that.

No, nothing much has changed in me as an actor. Since the day I started out, I always wanted to be part of good stories. The only thing that has changed is now I have options of good stories to choose from.

I want to work with Darren Aronofsky, Damien Chazelle, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and, of course, Majid Majidi.

Everybody is replaceable; nobody is irreplaceable here. If I'm going to say no to it because I want to do two films a year and sit at home, someone else will.

I have picked 'mainstream' films only because there is a story, and there are lovely people attached to it. That's a conscious decision always for me. What's the point if there is no story to tell?

I think every character is important in every film - be it small, primary, or lead - because they are adding something to the story, taking it forward.

The only thing that I know is that if I like a particular script, I want to be as honest to my character as possible. That's the only thing I can control. I have made a lot of decisions on an impulse, and I am going to continue that.

Whatever I am today is mostly because of my training at FTII. It taught me to be disciplined as an actor. People accuse us of being lazy and presume that we smoke up and laze about in the campus, which is not true at all. FTII courses are hard work.

We all have grown up watching Hindi romantic films, and when it comes to show love, that's probably how we show it.

People took notice of me and saw that I can carry off light-hearted roles as well. They started talking about Pritam Vidrohi, and it became a lovable character; I saw that people were clapping and whistling. It was a big high to watch this kind of reaction.

I was born and brought up in Gurgaon to a middle class family. My father, now retired, worked with the revenue department, and my mother is a housewife. I have two siblings who are both married and have kids. But I was always interested in doing something apart from studies.

My process of choosing scripts remains the same. Of whatever I read and whatever excites me is what I will continue to take up.

Whatever good is happening with 'Newton' is because of my mom's blessings. I really believe in that.

The kind of films I am doing are moderately budgeted and are with A-listers.

The process of playing a character as dark as Omar Saeed Sheikh is disturbing. So you have to mentally also be in that psyche, that state of mind. So, it was not easy. I was trying to cultivate a lot of anger and hatred in me while portraying him, because that's what I read and heard about him.

I take my work very seriously, but I don't take myself seriously.

I try to bring all my sincerity to the character I play. That way, I am dedicated.

We're just actors, man, just part of things. We're just doing our jobs, like everyone else does their jobs. The adulation for us is much more because we are always in the public eye. But I never became an actor because I wanted people to scream out my name.

My biggest high is just to be in front of the camera and be on a film set.

People in the industry know that FTII students have a different and an honest approach towards work. The place gave me a voice and the ability to see things from a different perspective.

What I believe is to keep working. How a film performs at the box office is not in my control: what is in my control is my work, how much honesty I can bring on-screen. I am happy people love me.

I chased my dream, worked hard for it, and now I am actually living that dream. This doesn't happen to everyone.

It's a one-day story of a guy called Newton Kumar, and the backdrop is election: how the most powerful tool we have as citizens is vote but how we don't utilise it. We really don't give importance to it. It talks about democracy; it's a satire, a black comedy.

A film like 'Kai Po Che!', 'Queen', 'Behen Hogi Teri' and 'Bareilly Ki Barfi' are not really independent films.

I always feel secure. I can't be a pure actor if I feel insecure. I can't let other things take over my love for acting. For me, it's a giving art. It is not something which I am doing for myself. I am doing it for my co-actors, unless it is something like 'Trapped'.

I was a very outgoing guy. I loved roaming around, hanging out with friends. From class 5th, I practised and learnt martial arts for about 7-8 years and have won medals at the national level. Then I trained in dancing on stage. In class 10th, I acted in my first play, and that's when I realised I wanted to become an actor.

I don't take pressure. I can't really work under pressure. I do one film at a time, and I try to live in that character and in the moment. I am not a futuristic person who thinks what is going to happen after five years. And I don't live in the past.

I want to keep running. I don't ever want this journey to finish. And for that to happen, you can't put too much of your brain in doing things and can't connect too many dots because, anyway, there is no guarantee of anything.

What's the fun in doing conventional things? I would rather be known as someone who is unconventional. I like being unconventional. I like doing things which are different. That's what I like... It gives me a boost as an actor.

I have always taken risks. I like doing films which are different.

There are times when I do feel very nervous when I start a film. And I feel very nervous before the release. I do get stuck in some scenes, but that's very natural and human. It happens to all the artistes in the world.

Winning in Berlinale, in Hong Kong, and then to get such an amazing response, reviews, and now to be India's official entry for Oscars... My mother is right up there and keeping a check on me. Her blessings are always going to be with me, I know.

How content-driven cinema worked so well... Yeah, the shift is definitely happening... It is such a good change, and it is the kind of change I would like to see so that we just go to watch a film and not put them into brackets - that this is an art film or commercial movie.

If you change nothing, nothing will change.

People will invest in you only if they see some kind of return, and that's the dark truth.

A lot of preparation was needed to play the character of Omar Sheikh in Omerta. I watched a lot of documentaries and hate speeches to cultivate anger in me.

Though 'Shahid' was the only true story, what happened in 'Trapped' can happen to anyone. And I am sure there are people like Newton, and there are boys who are naive, sweet, and rowdy, like my part in 'Bareilly'... The humanness is something I loved.

My parameter of judging a script has not changed over the years. I still go for a script where the story interests me. Yes, there are times where I might go wrong; say, out of five scripts, I might go wrong on one.