Sumeet Vyas, the writer and actor who shot to fame with the web series, 'Permanent Roommates', on his first Bollywood lead role
Right hand, middle finger. Follow Sumeet Vyas closely on any of the web series he has acted in — 'Permanent Roommates', Official Chukyagiri or Tripling — and a stolid gold ring flashes there.
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It is not an exceptional piece of male jewellery; in fact, it's as common as they come. A square block set with nine precious stones. "None of my directors have ever objected to it, so it stayed on. My father gifted it to me in the eighth standard — to help me focus in life," says Vyas. He then pushes the ring halfway through his finger and continues, "My finger changed shape through my growing years because I have hardly removed the ring since. But, I am loyal like that. Whether it’s this ring or friends or even just the flower-seller near the temple — once I find something that works for me, I keep it for life."
Vyas is narrating this, seated in a vanity van parked inside a residential complex in Thakur Village, Kandivli East. We have caught him during a break from the shoot for Ribbon, which brings the 33-year-old actor — known widely as the poster-boy of indie web series — into his first Bollywood lead role. Directed by Rakhee Sandilya, the film takes a closer look at a young urban couple grappling with the modern definitions of husband and wife. Vyas describes his character — a civil engineer by profession — as "a regular guy raised in a middle-class family who has moved up the ladder and married someone he loved." "There is a part of him that is mildly chauvinistic and another that it fighting it. It’s like this — he is sharing equal responsibilities with his wife and that makes him feel that he is doing something special," explains Vyas.
One of us
Which is why Vyas’ account of his ring should come as no surprise, really, if you consider the roles he has played or scripted. Whether as the well-meaning yet slow-witted Mikesh Choudhary in The Viral Fever’s (TVF) Permanent Roommates or as the heartbroken and frustrated Chandan in Tripling (which he also co-wrote with Akarsh Khurana) and now as the new-age husband and father in Ribbon, Vyas has inevitably come to depict characters that the average Mumbaikar can effortlessly identify with.
It could be that we have seen these boys, boyfriends and bosses around us. "These characters are relevant and relatable as most of us working in big cities have come from small towns," he says, unhesitatingly bringing up the time when he was dining at a restaurant in a swish five-star in the early 2000s. He was nearing his 20s and was part of Nadira Babbar's theatre-group, Ekjute, back then. "It was going well until I began struggling with the cutlery. Then, Nadiraji said, 'Haath se khaalo'. I haddifficulty believing it," he says.
However, Vyas infuses these characters with a lightness of being; they will brawl with Mumbai’s infamous brokers, go through ugly break-ups and deal with the challenges of fatherhood, but never give in to angsty monologues.
Breaking away
However, Vyas is also keen on breaking the mould that he has so intentionally created. He admits he is tired of playing 'nice-guy' parts and in search of a Scarface or an Agneepath (the 1990 one, that is); his new Bollywood lead role will see him in a more serious vein, unlike the lovable duffer Mikesh.
"I get bored of playing the same character and someone who is close to who I am. I am not at all like Mikesh in real life (I hope!), which is why it was fun playing him. I am not the docile man from Choker Bali. It is important that I keep breaking any image of myself that I create. That way, I think I’ll a longer shelf-life as an artiste and audiences will ask: Now what is he going to be? Because what gets people interested in an actor is the mystery," he elaborates.
Vyas has previously acted in Bollywood films English Vinglish and, more recently, Parched. He says that Sandilya brings the flavour of a documentary to the film. He and co-star Kalki Koechlin have been workshopped and taken through emotional graphs for the film, but dialogues are improvised on shoot. If you liked Before Sunrise or Blue Valentine, Vyas says, Ribbon will be right up your alley.
As scriptwriter for Ronnie Screwvala’s indie film, and with another lead role opposite Swara Bhaskar lined up, Vyas has been inevitably hearing the many “Welcome to Bollywood” congratulatory notes recently. ‘You have arrived’ is a common strain as well. But, for anyone who thinks web series are a step below mainstream Bollywood, Vyas recalls the budget TVF spent on each episode of Permanent Roommates — nearly R35 lakhs. Or just meet the fans, streaming those episodes on their mobile phones, right next to you on the local.
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