Two good Shreyas hangs on hope

Shreyas Talpade eagerly awaited the fraternity's reaction to his film The Hangman, which premiered in the city yesterday. The premiere coincided with the actor's birthday. Shreyas flew down from Goa to celebrate the two occasions together. He shares his hopes for 2010 with CS:



The year ahead
Honestly, there's a lot of hope that this year will negate the bad effects of 2009. I want to be a part of good films, but at the same time, I'm looking ahead to the projects I've already signed on -- Hum Tum Aur Shabana with Tusshar Kapoor and Minissha Lamba, Rakesh Mehra Production's Mad Madder Maddest, Hook Ya Crook, Golmaal 3 and the February release of Click, a horror film. It's a good mix of comedy and drama. But what I'm most happy about is the release of The Hangman, especially since it's premiering on my birthday. I did it way before Iqbal, but the film got stuck because of some issues.

In touch with reality
We have to keep changing with time. An actor, director, writer has to risk working on a genre or subject that will still be fresh and relevant six months down the line. I choose subjects that I like and to get into the character, I keep myself updated by staying in touch with the school and college kids. I grab as much as I can from them, as today's generation is not going to accept mediocre scripts or acting. And thankfully, the industry is becoming more and more comfortable with trying out new ideas.

Flight of fancy
My free time is mostly filled with reading and watching films. This year though, my wife Dipti and I have decided to become a bit more active on the social front. However, learning to fly is high on our agenda. Initially, it started as a joke. I have two dogs -- Donald and Knight. We don't like to leave them behind when we travel, but are forced to do so because of airline restrictions. So we'd joke about flying and owning an airline and saving pilot expenses. But now we want to take it up seriously.

Dream project
For me, every role that I take up is challenging. An actor has to understand what the director wants to portray and if you manage to do that, then there's nothing more intoxicating. Recently, I heard a rumour that Nagesh (Kukunoor) is casting me in a film on Kishore Kumar. Portraying Kishoreda on screen is my dream role. It'd be one hell of a job, bringing alive the multi-faceted, multi-talented, everything rolled into one person -- Kishoreda.