18 July,2010 08:10 AM IST | | Subhash K Jha
Rajat Barmecha says he was made to stay away from cellphones and television in preparation to play a troubled teen
His performance in the Anurag Kashyap-produced Udaan is already fetching him rave reviews, but it was no easy task for 21-year-old Rajat Barmecha, who had to spend time alone in Jamshedpur, without a cellphone or television, to feel the trauma of a boy in his condition, under the guardianship of a tyrannical father.
The Delhi boy says he has lived a "chilled out" life. But that was until he started shooting for the just-released film. "I was not allowed to meet anyone and had to spend hours alone in my room to feel like my character Rohan would. I wasn't allowed a television, and my cellphone was confiscated. That was the hardest part. I can't live without my phone. Or so I thought. I wasn't even allowed to talk to my parents back home," he says.
Director Vikramaditya Motwane also made Barmecha watch films that he believed would give him an insight into Rohan's troubled mind. "Vikram made me watch Francois Truffaut's 400 Blows, Curtis Hanson's 8 Miles and Stephen Daldry's Billy Elliot," the young actor says.
Barmecha admits that method acting in his debut film was tough. "But the isolation helped me enter Rohan's mind, which was important because his background is so different from mine. His father is a disciplinarian, while my dad is relaxed. Rohan is packed off to boarding school. I wasn't. He has a stepbrother. I have an older brother and sister."
Incidentally, Barmecha's siblings have now shifted to Mumbai to be with their brother, and all three now want to pursue a career in films. Barmecha, of course, is the family star. "To have gone to Cannes with my very first film was an honour. I met several Hollywood directors and they liked my performance. Now comes the real test.
Let's see how much people here like Udaan. My future in Hindi films will depend on that."
