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Late actor Irrfan Khan was a year junior to actor-writer-musician Piyush Mishra at the National School of Drama (NSD). After Irrfan died in 2020, Mishra often remembered his junior with love and affection. But little did we know that the two seasoned actors were once ‘rivals’ and ‘criticised’ each other for their style of acting.
Piyush, while interacting with BBC Hindi for the promotion of his recently released autobiography ‘Tumhari Aukat Kya Hai’, recounted his experience of working with Irrfan in the 2003 critically-acclaimed film Maqbool. The actor shared that before meeting on the set of the Vishal Bhardwaj drama, the two shared a senior-junior relationship.
He said, “He was my rival there (NSD). He used to be on a different trip of acting and I used to be on a different trip. He was a very thinking actor and I used to work on intuition. He used to criticise me and I used to criticise him.” However, the two came closer during the shoot of Maqbool. In the movie, Irrfan played the titular character and Piyush essayed the role of Kaka.
While filming, Irrfan helped Piyush as he had a better understanding of cinema due to his turn as a TV actor. Piyush shared, “In the film, he supported me a lot. He had more experience than me because of his work in television. I never did TV. In that film, everyone helped everyone. It was like a world cup, which every team wanted to win, and every team won as well.”
Maqbool proved to be a significant addition to Piyush Mishra’s filmography. But, had he not recovered from an accident on time, he might have missed the chance to share the screen with some of the ‘big people’. Piyush narrated, “I was about to leave (for a workshop of Maqbool) and at that time I had the habit of drinking and I was leaving after having a drink. My casting was done already but I met with an accident. So, it hurt me a lot when I thought that if the workshop starts now, I won’t be able to go.”
The actor was worried since it was his “first major break.” Piyush added, “It was such a major role. So many big people were working on it. I was worried about losing the film. But, thankfully workshop started later. Also, though it was a dreadful accident, I didn’t get any major injuries. So, I got to attend the workshop. If I had got any major injury, I would not have been able to do Maqbool.”
Maqbool had its premiere at the Toronto Film Festival in 2003 and was released in India in 2004. The film brought actor Pankaj Kapur National Film Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance as Abba Ji in the movie.
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