‘Big stars don’t even look at supporting cast’: Rajesh Kumar exposes harsh ‘class system’ on Bollywood sets, calls lead stars ‘insecure’

In a recent chat shared on Aftab Puntoo’s YouTube channel, Rajesh said that if one visits the set of a big film, the conversations about a scene are limited to only 4-5 people. “If you go on a big set, only 4-5 people are discussing everything. Director, cinematographer, the main actors and the main writer. Rest of the people, their experiences, they don’t count for anything,” he said.

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Lead actors don’t want to be ‘overshadowed’ by supporting actors

Rajesh said that while he has never worked with Amitabh Bachchan, he has heard that the veteran actor likes to rehearse his scenes with the supporting cast members, but that’s not the case with other stars. “Lately, I have not seen any main actor rehearse with us. Either they rehearse with the writer or the assistant. They don’t have any interaction with the secondary cast and that is why the film suffers because sometimes people think that the secondary actor might overshadow us,” he said and suggested that the stars are sometimes insecure of working with talented supporting cast members, so they tend to throw hurdles in their path. “They make it so that the secondary cast gets their lines at the last moment. This way, the actor is just consumed with learning the lines,” he said.

Without naming names, Rajesh recalled his personal experience where a “great actor” wouldn’t even look at him and asked the assistant as to why he was performing in a particular way. “I have worked with some ‘great actors’ who will not look at you and will ask the associate, ‘Yeh aisa kyu bol rahe hain (Why is he saying this)? No, we don’t need rehearsal. We will go for a take,” he said and added, “I am just saying that we need to get out of this system.”

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Dimple Kapadia ‘inspired’ Rajesh Kumar

While he spoke about some of the negative incidents, Rajesh made sure that he highlighted his positive experiences as well. He recalled working with Dimple Kapadia on Teri Baaton Mein Aisa Uljha Jiya in Jodhpur and said that she “inspired” him as she was interested in learning more about the actors she was working with, instead of staying in her bubble. “In this matter, there was Dimple Kapadia who inspired us,” he said and recalled that one day, as the cast members were fawning over her, she thanked them for all the compliments and asked them about their lives. “Five minutes into the conversation, she just said, ‘Sorry to stop you all. I take all the compliments with gratitude but please tell me something about yourselves. How did you get into this line of work? What kind of roles do you like? Because I don’t know so many things, so I want to know about you.’ This inspired me,” he recalled.

He also recalled working on Saiyaara and said that director Mohit Suri was the one with the vision, and all the cast members, including lead actors Ahaan Panday and Aneet Padda, completely surrendered to him. And Rajesh followed their lead as well.

About Rajesh Kumar

Rajesh Kumar first shot to fame with Sarabhai vs Sarabhai but in the two decades since that show, he has appeared in shows like Baa Bahoo Aur Baby, Neeli Chatri Waale; web series like Kota Factory, Yeh Meri Family and films like Saiyaara, Nishaanchi, Teri Baaton Mein Aisa Uljha Jiya, among many others.