I was among the first batch of the students to graduate from the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune in 1966, but it wasn't my passport to Bollywood. At that time, no one understood that it is possible to learn acting in an institute.
After finishing my study in Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), I was mentally prepared for the struggle in the film industry.
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.
I am a product of the Film and Television Institute of India, so I never categorised my roles, but yes I was typecast by the producers and the directors as a villain.
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.
Naseer Sir taught me while I was a student at the Film and Television Institute of India. Anything I know about acting is thanks to him.
I am an actor. It's very unfair when people categorise and term me as a television actor or film actor.
When you come from FTII, people take you seriously. The environment at the institute is very conducive to learning.
I'm an actor and I am looking for roles where I can continue to evolve, and things that are challenging. I gravitate to the roles, not necessarily television or film. It's just the fact that, for me, the most interesting roles have been in television.
Everyone who comes to the entertainment industry wants to be a film actor. Who wants to be a television actor by choice? I want to change the perception of Indian television as being the poor man's medium.
Film, theater and television always kind of scared me. I don't ever seriously think of myself as an actor at all, and I don't plan any film career or television career.
When I entered the industry in the early 1970s, I was a gold medalist from the film institute, Pune. That was when graduates from the film institute were very quickly absorbed by the mainstream commercial industry.
What happens in Israel, it's not so divided between being a film actor, or a TV actor - usually, we just do everything. I do theater, film, and television, and the theater is mostly financed by the government.
When '36 Chowringhee Lane' was released in 1981, I was a student of the Film and Television Institute of Tamil Nadu. Everyone who had seen the film was very impressed with its flawless direction and acting. But we, cinematography students, were stunned by the visual style, which was truly international.
There are 600 districts in India. Every district in India has a teacher-training institute.
When I became the chair of the British Film Institute, I didn't understand how much of my time would be taken up with trying to make a case for the British Film Institute: what it's for, why it exists, why it needs its money.