Himanshu Malik: Faced prejudice from within the industry when I turned a director

When Himanshu Malik decided to shift gears from being an actor to a director, he didn’t know that it would turn out to be the biggest battle of his life. He reveals that his decision was not at all welcomed in the industry.

Malik, who gained recognition as an actor with the 2001 movie Tum Bin, made his directorial debut with Chitrakut earlier this year. He shares, “One of the biggest challenges of changing gears was that I faced a lot of prejudice. The shift from being an actor to being a filmmaker was a very complex one, not for me, but for a lot of other people,” Malik tells us.

Malik goes on to reveal his experience, mentioning, “It has been one of the biggest battles of my career. The whole journey of being an actor to a director. I was 21-year-old when I started in the industry as a model, and then an actor”.

He continues, “I didn’t even know anything about the industry when I started out. I had that typical, what we call pop success in Bollywood. But (now during the transition), the prejudice was huge”.

What makes him say that? “For me to convince people to see this film, Chitrakut, was so difficult in the early stages of making it. After that, we had a whole team backing it, but the start was rough,” says Malik, also known for projects such as Jungle, Khwahish and Rog.

“There were people who said ‘Why are you making the film? What’s the point? Don’t do this’. They were like ‘you look good, just lose weight and act more and have a good time’. I kept thinking that filmmaking is something that I want to do,” says the 49-year-old.

For his directorial debut, he picked story around the journey of change through the lives of five people as they go on a quest to dine love and companionship. Now, he is determined to continue the journey as a director, instead of an actor.

“I just want to make films now. I don’t think I will act now. But let’s see what happens,” he ends.