Before making his Bollywood debut, Randeep Hooda was living every aspiring actor’s dream – getting paid by a studio, month on month, while Ram Gopal Varma hunted for the perfect launch pad
Randeep Hooda
Randeep Hooda completed 20 years in the film industry this year. The actor feels that he is currently in the best phase of his life. However, the beginning of his career was marked by unexpected breaks. He had featured in a movie called Monsoon Wedding, which was released in 2001, before making a proper Hindi film debut in D.
Ram Gopal Varma offered Randeep Hooda a role in shelved film ‘Ek’
In a conversation with Mid-day’s Sit With Hitlist series, Randeep Hooda opened up about not taking any projects between 2001 and 2005, when his first Hindi film D was released.
Randeep revealed that Ram Gopal Varma had offered him a film called Ek, in which he was supposed to play a supervillain alongside actors like Ajay Devgn, Suniel Shetty, Naseeruddin Shah, Amitabh Bachchan, and other big names of that time. However, the film never got made.
“He told me it’s not happening but also told me not to do any other movie. He said, ‘I’ll find a role and launch you.’ So, I was on a three-year salary—like the studio system—to not do any other work.”
Hooda further shared, “I asked him, ‘How will I pay my bills?’ He asked me about my expenses. I inflated it and said Rs 35,000. He said, ‘Done.’ I then said to myself, ‘I should have asked for Rs 50,000.’ So very diligently, on the first of every month, I would go and collect my cheque—and do nothing.”
“My struggle was never to get work. It was always to get the kind of work that I would gel with,” he added.
Randeep Hooda on why Ram Gopal Varma offered a newcomer free pay
When asked what impressed RGV enough to make him such an offer, Hooda said, “Shimit Amin had come to me with a role in Ab Tak Chhappan—that of a rookie cop. He came to Prithvi, and I think Ramu also came and saw the play. They called me, and I met him at Barista. We met, and I said I would rather do Nana Patekar’s role.”
“I didn’t do the movie but was summoned by Ramu (RGV),” Hooda added. Verma asked him to take off his T-shirt to show off his physique. Later that day, when Hooda told his then-girlfriend about what happened, she yelled at him for not being polite and humble. So, the next time Varma called him to meet, Hooda decided to not throw his weight around and be humble.
Upon meeting him again, Varma said, “I liked you better last time.” Hooda then went back to being himself and inquired about the role.
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