5 min readMumbaiAug 20, 2023 07:54 AM IST
Actor and filmmaker Sohum Shah, has shone through his works like Ship of Theseus, Tumbbad, Maharani and was last seen in Reema Kagti and Zoya Akhtar’s crime thriller Dahaad. His journey in the film industry has not been without its challenges — the biggest being his fear whether he will even be accepted. Sohum says that coming from a small town called Sriganganagar in Rajasthan, he felt like an outsider who could not fit in Bollywood. He says that he did not speak in English and was “very unaware about international cinema”.
Sohum describes his journey in Bollywood as “long and tough” and had to put in an “extra effort” to fit in and be patient in his career. “It’s been a long and tough journey. It is for anyone who comes here from small towns. It takes a lot of time, we have to put in a lot of effort and be patient,” he told indianexpress.com in an interview.
Talking about his beginning in a sleepy town, the actor-filmmaker says, “Pakistan is around 20-25 kms away from my village, so is Punjab and Haryana. Ganganagar is technically in Pakistan but the culture, the food has a Punjabi influence. It is a slow-paced town. I remember in 2011, when I was travelling to Dubai, a friend had asked me to buy shoes of a particular brand from there as branded stuff were not available in Ganganagar, but it has now changed. In 2017 when I was in my town, things were changing (for the good) rapidly,” Sohum reminisces contentedly.
He confesses that he had a limited exposure to films while growing up, he felt alienated in the Maximum City. He shares, “I have spent my teenage years wondering how exciting acting was, the world of cinema was. Every time I saw Shah Rukh Khan on the big screen, I felt, ‘yeh kitna mast hai, Aisa kuch karna chaahiye zindagi mein kabhi’ (how cool it is, I want to do this at some point in my life). I harboured this dream but it was far from my reach. People like me, who come from small town, have ‘ajeeb sa darr’ (a weird fear) of cities like Mumbai. The city feels like another world altogether, far away from our means and reach.”
Sohum, after spending a couple of years in Mumbai, returned to Rajasthan because he felt “out of place” as he did not speak English. “My initial years were very tough, I had run away from home to be here. But it wasn’t easy to be here, I would be scared to even go to a cafe and order a cup of coffee for myself. I wouldn’t know how people ordered their coffees here, I felt a kind of pressure when I first came to Mumbai, so I packed my bags and went back,” Sohum shares.
Talking about his struggle, Sohum says, “People have different struggles. My struggle was more psychological. For seven to eight years I fought with the thought of leaving Mumbai and returning, I would wonder ‘do I really need to be here?’ I already had my bread-butter, car, home, because I had already earned it, so why was I here? But I know there was something pulling me towards films and acting, it was the need to explore myself and express myself.”
Sohum explains how Tumbbad finally gave him the courage to pursue his dream. “I had a constant fear that I don’t fit here, I hardly spoke in English or discussed English films. I came from Ganganagar where I saw four English films which were dubbed in Hindi. I didn’t know who was Martin Scorsese or Marlon Brando, I didn’t even know who Tom Cruise or Ricky Martin were. People around me were proper intellectuals, well read people who had travelled the world. But that is changing, there is a lot of acceptance now. Now Hindi is cool, according to me. In 2010-2011 if you didn’t know English, there was a class difference. For over ten years I felt this pressure, it was traumatic.”
Actor- filmmaker Sohum Shah talks about his journey in the Hindi film industry. (Photo: Sohum Shah/ Instagram)