Newcomers Roundtable 2017: Harshvardhan Kapoor, Jim Sarbh, Fatima, Shobhita on fame, nepotism and more

After film buffs received ample fodder through Rajeev Masand’s Actors Roundtable, Actresses Roundtable and Directors Roundtable, Masand delivered the exclamation point through the Newcomers Roundtable 2017.

The 50-minute long discussion featured Harshvardhan Kapoor, the son of Anil Kapoor and brother of Sonam Kapoor, who made his debut with Rakesh Omprakash Mehra’s romantic epic Mirzya. He was joined by Jim Sarbh who shared the screen space with Sonam in Ram Madhvani’s Neerja last year. Among the ladies were Fatima Sana Shaikh who played the grown up Geeta Phogat in Nitesh Tiwari’s wrestling biopic Dangal, and Shobhita Dhulipala who stepped into the shoes of Smrutika in Anurag Kashyap’s dark thriller Raman Raghav 2.0.

The four debutantes from last year discussed a myriad range of issues and even shared some interesting anecdotes. Harshvardhan addressed the controversy regarding him voicing his opinion against Diljit Dosanjh winning the Filmfare Most Promising Debut (Male) award, claiming that the latter has worked in over 25 films in Punjabi cinema. Harshvardhan confessed that Dosanjh is a brilliant actor but his statement was misconstrued by the media who turned into an issue of entitlement, thus projecting Harshvardhan as a sore loser.

Sarbh talked about the diverse range of filmmakers he is working under, such as Madhvani, Homi Adjania in Raabta, Sanjay Leela Bhansali in Padmavati and Rajkumar Hirani in the Sanjay Dutt biopic. Sarbh recalled how confusing it was to shoot a 45-minute take without any cuts in Neerja when his character hijacks the flight. He contrasted it with Padmavati where he was surprised by how his co-star Ranveer Singh approached the scene. He was taken aback by the precision that Bhansali drills into his actors.

Shaikh discussed how she almost gave up on acting and turned to photography after she was jobless for three years. She recalled that she was rejected multiple times because the makers claimed that she was no Deepika Padukone. “But I don’t want to be Deepika Padukone. I want to fill my own space in the Hindi film industry,” she said.

Dhulipala compared her preparation time for Raman Raghav 2.0 to that of Harshvardhan for Mirzya and Shaikh for Dangal. While the other two actors got months to get into the skin of the character, she was asked to start shooting two days after she auditioned for her part.