What If Siddhanth Chaturvedi Played The Gully Boy?

You  just can’t take your eyes  off from him .Every time he is on the screen debutant Siddhanth Chaturvedi playing the  hiphop musician  M C Sher  in  Zoya Akhtar’s  Gully Boy, simply steals the  frame from everyone   else.

Is this what  is  known as a  natural-born scenestealer?

Siddhanth laughs,  “I waited  for this moment.  I  held myself back. I  didn’t accept any  of the earlier roles  that came my way before Gully Boy.The  impact has been far bigger than I  expected.I am  getting so many calls and messages. I’m trying to respond  to all  of them. But it’s getting  to be  impossible.”

 Indeed  the impact that Siddhanth  has made in Gully Boy is far greater than anything we’ve seen any debutant  in  recent times.And  to think Siddhanth plays  the second lead!

But no regrets.  “I  knew what  I was getting into. I had waited very long for this. And  I knew  the team  I was working with would take  good care of , and they did.It’s really  ironical  that I mentor Ranveer  Singh in Gully Boy because throughout the film he mentored me. Every time I’d  do a  shot I’d look  at him  for approval. And he would give me so much confidence. Even now I’m on the phone  taking advice from him,” says  Siddhath  whose life has  changed overnight  after  the release  of Gully Boy.

 When exactly  did he feel the  real impact  of his stardom?

Says Siddhanth, “Well, I couldn’t  attend the screening at  the Berlin Film Festival because of a torn  ligament in  my leg. So I missed  the excitement  of  my film’s first screening.  But after the release it’s been sheer madness. The  attention I am getting is  beyond anything I had imagined. I  used to dream  of stardom from childhood. When I was a child in hometown Nagwa(UP) my father  would take me to see every  film  on Friday.”

He moved to  Mumbai, the  city of his dream, when he was 6.

His chosen profession was acting from the start. “So this moment of my debut is something I’ve imagined  for  years. But  I never thought  the  response would be over overwhelming. The male and female attention is equally divided. The  guys who  approach me are like, ‘Bro, we really identify with  you.”

 Siddhanth had  to  really bulk up   for Gully  Boy to look older than Ranveer Singh.  “This meant I had  to eat all the  rich food that I  would never  touch otherwise. My Mom had her wish for the  first time. She  fed me all her cooking made  in pure ghee .On the sets I’d  eat all the  rich food while Ranveer and  Alia would look  away to avoid temptation.”

The newest heart throb in town gained a good 7 kgs for his part on  Gully Boy which he is now trying to lose before he begins his next film.

“What  would be my next? I don’t know. But one thing is for certain. Whatever roles I pick the  preparation would be as intense as it has been  for  Gully Boy.  For me there is  no  point in being an actor if  I don’t give  a hundred  percent of myself,” says  the young enthusiastic actor whom Zoya spotted  while he was  dancing at a party.

 Dancing reminds Siddhanth of an ugly incident at  a party where an A-list star had snubbed him. “I was  dancing as though I was all alone on the floor. I could see this this top star smirking. He  probably felt I  was trying to attract attention, and he was probably right. I walked up to him and said, ‘You  wait for Gully Boy to release. Then we’ll see.’ Luckily for me my career has taken off  just the way I though it would.”

No we will see.