Piyush Mishra says he doesn’t want to be bitter like industry folks who have spent lifetime criticising others: ‘Unka budhapa kharab gaya hai’

“Anurag Kashyap has a very good sense of cinema. People think we argue a lot before when we make our music, but it is actually not true,” Mishra tells SCREEN about the filmmaker. “We argue very little. We have stopped surprising each other– when I give him a song, he knows it is good, and he moves on. If he makes a good film, I am like, ya you made a good film. Now, he also makes bad films but then I don’t voice it out anymore.”

When asked why he holds back his opinions today, the 62-year-old artiste said he just doesn’t want to “criticise anyone for no reason.” Mishra said the way his life has shaped up, today, he doesn’t entertain anyone after 6 PM.

Watch Piyush Mishra talk about how ‘work saved him’

“I leave my social life after 6 PM and deep dive into prayer. Kashyap makes his films with passion, but something may not have landed and that’s completely fine. I don’t believe in sitting and criticising people, that ‘this actor is bad, that one is good.’

“Whoever has done this, unka budhapa bohot kharab gaya hai (their old age hasn’t been good). They become bitter and all of them are suffering today. Nobody welcomes then, they are all by themselves in their houses and are now facing the consequences. Why to lash out at someone?”

Piyush Mishra, currently gearing for his international music tour Udankhatola with his band Ballimaaraan, is now a revered artiste but he himself didn’t think highly of his craft when his screen debut happened with Mani Ratnam’s Dil Se. Starring Shah Rukh Khan and Manisha Koirala, the romantic drama featured him in the role of a CBI officer, a performance, Mishra confessed, was “bad”.

“I couldn’t understand it, which is why it is a bad performance. In Dil Se, I couldn’t understand the camera, lighting, make up and dubbing. I just didn’t know dubbing,” the actor said, who was coming to a film straight out of National School of Drama, where he was dubbed the ‘superstar of theatre.’

“But all big names were attached, like Mani Ratnam, Shah Rukh Khan, Manisha Koirala and I got the role because of Tigmanshu Dhulia, who was the casting director. It was a terrible performance, mujhe bohot kharab laga tha. I felt really awkward in the film. I had a shrill voice, erratic speech, I had no sense of anything.

“I had to wait for exactly five years for Maqbool to happen, which went on floors in 2003. I didn’t come back to Mumbai after Dil Se, I just kept preparing, corrected my speech, worked on myself. In Maqbool, I was happy with what I did,” he added.