Raghav Juyal talks about his price hike post Kisi ka Bhai Kisi Ki Jaan: Rates badh gaye; recalls living with 25 people in one room

On a sunny afternoon Raghav Juyal, who just wrapped one of his upcoming four movies – Yuddhra, a Guneet Monga’s production, a Karan Johar production and one that he cannot talk about due to “NDA” – lined up for release, is watching the birds chirp from his window, while he sits down to reminisce his journey from aspiring to be a background dancer to becoming an actor of a ₹100 crore club movie.

Rates badh gayeDespite it collecting ₹110.53 crores at the Indian box office Kisi Ka Bhai Kisi Ki Jaan was considered a damper given it was a Salman Khan starrer. However, for actor Raghav Juyal, who played Khan’s brother in the movie, it has been a great deal. “I’m not in the league to worry about crores. For me doing a hundred crore movie is enough. I don’t know what Salman Khan thinks about it. But for me it has been good. You are as good as your last release. Jo bhi tha mere liye bohot accha tha. Rate badh gaye, ab aur kitne honestly bolu,” Juyal shares.

Two months down and Juyal has already moved on from the project. As he speaks to us, he wrapped up the shooting of his next movie. Juyal has four films lined up for release: Yuddhra, a Guneet Monga’s production, a Karan Johar production and one that he cannot talk about due to “NDA”. “I try to live in the present, ab aage badho! Main atka nahi rehta. When I went to shoot for this movie, I didn’t have any baggage that I have done KKBKKJ,” he mentions.

Shot in dengue

Juyal has quite literally shed his blood and sweat for the movie. “I have worked in double shifts for the movie, I would sleep in the vanity van and I even shot when I had dengue,” he recalls. While he is back to auditioning for other projects, he mentions how KKBKKJ was the only movie for which he didn’t audition. “Bhai called me,” he states. It was during Holi last year, when he was shooting for Yuddhra, when he got a call from Khan, which he initially assumed was a prank call.

Rejection se darr nahi lagta sahab

Talking about auditions, Juyal reveals he is immune to rejections. The harsh criticisms from casting directors may hurt others, but Juyal looks at it otherwise. “Wohi (criticism) toh chahiye tha… I had ghar, a car, everything was fine, I was getting crores on TV. I have creativity ka keeda in me, I like when people tell me point out my flaws, I have been rejected in auditions. If you give 20 auditions, you will get selected in two, that’s the ratio. When I entered acting, I told myself I am no one. Main Sanjay Mishra (actor) ke ghar pe pocha lagane ke liye bhi tayyar tha, because my motive was to learn. Celebrity ke kambal odh ke aaoge toh character ke kambal kaise odhoge,” he elaborates.

The reason he mentions Mishra, is because of the movie that the two starred in – Bahut hua Samman. “Waha se meri acting journey shuru hui (Sanjay Mishra ki film). I lost the greed of doing lead roles. People would tell me, ‘You are a star in TV, why do you not do lead roles’ and I was like, ‘No, I’m happy with just doing a 4 minute role but I’ll get to learn’,” he shares.

Juyal admits that there was learning on the job, he did take acting seriously and learnt the craft from actor-mentor Saurabh Sachdeva. “I believe one needs to have a strong backbone in any craft. If you want to be an actor you need to know acting, baaki sab abs wagera secondary hai,” he says. He reveals he had years of practise for dancing, so acting needed a bit as well.

Main back dancer banne aaya tha, ye sab kuch bonus chal raha hai

It was in 2011, when Juyal came to Mumbai for a dance reality show Chak Dhoom Dhoom. “Main back dancer banne aaya tha, ye sab kuch bonus chal raha hai,” he quips. Back in the day Juyal used to work at a dancing studio. “I used to live there (in the studio) as I used to manage it, but I ever romanticised my struggles. Because that was jannat for me as I got to practise all night and there was no rok no tok,” he reminisces. While he says he doesn’t romantice his struggles, he actually doesn’t. “Ek vada paav mein pura din chalta tha…Uss time young ladke waise bhi awara gardi karte the. We used to live with 25 guys in one room. We didn’t have a cupboard, but we had a dysfunctional fridge, so we would keep our underwear in our fridge. But I never looked at it as a bad phase. I used to have fun,” he signs off.