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Darshan Kumar on the making of NH10

From Mary Kom to NH10, Darshan Kumar is making his presence felt in women-oriented films. Here the talented actor speaks about the making of his latest movie.

NH10 was supposed to mark his Bollywood debut but as luck would have it, Mary Kom (2014) came out first. Darshan Kumar came into the limelight as Priyanka Chopra’s understanding husband in Mary Kom. This weekend Darshan will be seen in a gritty, violent and adult-rated thriller NH10 directed by Navdeep Singh. NH10 is about an urban couple losing their way in the world of violence and lawlessness. It revolves around the character played by Anushka Sharma who is forced to discover her dark side to survive in a clash of culture that ends badly for both sides. Depsite popular preception Darshan does not see his character as a negative lead. “From my point of view, I am right but from Anushka’s character’s point of view I am wrong. I am playing a guy who belongs to Haryana. He is a family man but he is stuck in a situation from which he doesn’t know how to come out. How he tries to come out of that situation is his story.”

BEHIND THE SCENES
With no reference point to base his character on, Darshan was forced to create his own identity in the movie, though he admits “the essence of the character came easy to me as I am from Delhi.” Director Navdeep Singh made the entire team take an intensive 10 days workshop to understand the character they were portraying by mingling with the locals. “Every morning we used to sit together and work on our characters. We used to travel 200kms in a jeep and meet locals at wayside dhabas. We would have long chats with them, eat with them and understand their mood and try to pick up their mannerisms,” said Darshan while explaining his method of approaching this role.

CHANGE IN CAST
Freida Pinto was supposed to produce and play the lead in this heroine-oriented project but the making of this film took a long time and the Slumdog Millionaire backed out of the project. Once Anushka Sharma came on board, she replaced Raj Kumar Rao with the Shaitaan actor Neil Bhoopalam. “Freida Pinto was on board first as a producer and lead actress, and then I came on board along with Raj Kumar Yadav. I am the only original cast member now, as Anushka and Neil are doing the other roles now,” Darshan explained. From what we hear even Sonam Kapoor was offered the role at one stage but turned it down.

PREPARATION FOR THE GRITTY SIDE
Darshan’s character abuses and torments Anushka’s character. To remain true to his character, he decided to maintain distance from the actress on the sets as well. “I used to run away from Anushka everytime I would spot her! Till the end of the shooting schedule, I did not even say ‘hi’ to her. I wanted to give that freshness to my role and I thought it was better that we do not mingle. When the shooting got over, I went up to her and told her, ‘Hi, I am Darshan, I was not showing attitude to you but I wanted to remain in my character, hence I never spoke to you.”
The actor is all praise for his more famous co-actor. “Anushka is a great actress. She is very spontaneous and hard working. One day we were doing an action scene and the take was okay but she wanted me to push her harder, so she told me, ‘Throw me in a serious way.’ What is better than finding a co-star who is so supportive? As a producer she gave us comfort even though we were shooting in real locations – our vanity van used to be 10 kilometers away from the location, even tea used to take half an hour to reach us. ”

DIRECTOR’S CALL
Navdeep Singh who made his debut with the critically acclaimed Manorama Six Feet Under in 2007 directs this movie. “I met Navdeep, he gave me the script, called me for an audition and offered me this role the next day itself. Later on he told me that he was planning to cast a leading star for this role but when he saw my audition, he was convinced that I could play the part. Navdeep is a great director, even when he does rehearsals, you can see the passion. He wants more from his actor.”

WOMEN POWER
Last year, two women oriented films Queen and Mary Kom did great business at the box office and were critically acclaimed as well. What does Darshan think of this changing trend in Bollywood?
“Films are about narrating a story. It can have many characters, so why not lead female characters? The world is changing and people are welcoming this new kind of change in cinema.”

arti@khaleejtimes.com