In the last few years, Pankaj Tripathi has emerged as a talent to vouch for in Bollywood and the national award-winning actor is grateful for the response of the audiences and industry.
The actor has been around in the industry for nearly 15 years, but gained prominence by, first, featuring in the Gangs of Wasseypur series and subsequently in films like Masaan, Nil Battey Sannata, Bareilly Ki Barfi, Newton and Stree among others.
With seven film releases in 2017, eight in 2018, besides the runaway success of 'Sacred Games' and 'Mirzapur', Tripathi recently shot his solo lead 'Kagaz' in Sitapur and has makers queuing up to sign him. It is going to be a packed 2019 for Pankaj. His upcoming films are Shakeela's biopic which stars Richa Chadha, Hrithik Roshan's 'Super 30', Dharma Production's 'Drive', Anubhav Sinha's 'Abhi To Party Shuru Hui Hai' and Satish Kaushik's 'Kagaz'.
As the world celebrates World Theatre Day on March 27, shares his first ever professional theatre experiences and memories associated with it.
My first play was "Leela Nandlal Ki" story by Bhishm Sahani and director was Vijay Kumar a National School of Drama pass out.
The story is about a scooter that gets lost and the protagonist goes to police station to make a complaint. I was playing both the characters of a cop and a thief. It was my first play and for the first time I performed in front of Patna audiences who don't even know me and to my pleasant surprise they liked my performances in both the characters even though I was not great performer at that time nor I was trained in diction but I open heartedly performed on my impulse and the audience liked my performance and even misjudged me as a NSD pass out since the director was from NSD.
The next day in a local newspaper review of the play was printed and it was also mentioned about me that I have a great potential and a possibility of being a good actor. That one line grabbed my attention that in one play the critics and the newspaper figured out my potential and possibility as an actor which was quite huge for me raising high my interest and confidence into acting further and to next level. This was in the year November-December 1996.
In fact my encounter with the theatre came much before in my village in Gopalganj district during one of the festivals Chhath that is celebrated in Bihar and now everywhere. This play use to be organized by a local drama group. Raghav Saran Tiwari was my first director and it was a very amateur play. Even in that play the locals of my village liked my performance and appreciated a lot. Since then seed of acting was sown inside me, that now I have to learn acting.
Five years after that play after migrating to Patna I did Bhism Sahani's "Leela Nandlal Ki" play.