4 min learnMumbaiCould 28, 2026 08:33 AM IST
Ashutosh Gowariker, greatest recognized for steering epics like Lagaan (2001), Swades (2004), Jodhaa Akbar (2008), started his profession as an actor. In actual fact, he and his Lagaan actor and producer Aamir Khan made their debut collectively in Ketan Mehta’s 1984 coming-of-age movie Holi. He additionally starred alongside his Swades actor Shah Rukh Khan in Aziz Mirza’s 1989 tv present Circus and Kundan Shah’s 1994 romantic drama Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa.
“After I was youthful, there was all the time strain that you just needed to be the quintessential hero and attempt to be that constructive character, and look and be a selected manner on display screen. As we speak, it’s liberating. You don’t have to fret about your coiffure. I like it now,” Gowariker tells SCREEN in an unique interview. He recollects being requested to continuously examine his hair earlier than each shot. “I’m positive the ladies nonetheless have to try this. I don’t must,” he provides, smiling.
The actor-director feels occasions are extra “liberating” right now, which he’s having fun with. After helming the three epics talked about above, after which going through a hunch in his directorial profession with duds like What’s Your Raashee? (2009), Khelein Hum Jee Jaan Sey (2010), and Mohenjo Daro (2016), Gowariker returned to appearing after 16 years with Rajesh Mapuskar’s 2016 Nationwide Award-winning Marathi movie Ventilator, which was produced by his What’s Your Raashee? actor Priyanka Chopra’s banner Purple Pebble Photos.
“Once you’re directing a movie, it’s such a deeply demanding film you could’t give attention to anything. You need to focus solely on that. I all the time wished to behave, however I by no means had the time,” says Gowariker. “So, Ventilator got here at a time when Mohenjo Daro was within the post-production, and I might give it the time I needed to,” he provides.
Ashutosh Gowariker (centre) starred in Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa.
Gowariker then obtained busy with directing his subsequent epic Panipat, which additionally failed on the field workplace. However he didn’t leap again into instantly, and returned solely seven years after Ventilator with Sameer Saxena’s 2023 survival thriller Kaala Paani on Netflix India. “After that, I’ve all the time performed components I get interested in and which I really feel all the expertise can be good for me,” he says, having appeared in three Marathi movies, adopted by his newest Hindi film, System on Prime Video India.
System occurred when Gowariker ran into fellow filmmaker Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari at an afterparty throughout Worldwide Movie Pageant of India (IFFI), Goa in 2024. “She mentioned, ‘Hey, Ashu sir! I wish to forged you in my film!’ I mentioned, ‘Completed, I’m doing.’ That was the tip of that. I believed raat gayi baat gayi. One yr later, she related and informed me it’s a courtroom drama. She wished me to play a lawyer, who’s generally known as the ‘fox’ within the legal professionals circle,” recollects Gowariker.
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“I really feel you get your due on the proper time. And everytime you get it, that’s the proper time. There’s no such factor as ‘this could have occurred earlier,’” says Gowariker, who’s but to start out working actively on his subsequent epic. However within the meantime, he’s busy shuttling between appearing gigs, helming the docuseries Temple Raiders, and producing movies for different administrators. “You’ve to discover totally different avenues. I used to be all the time shying away from an internet sequence, the documentary style, and producing for different administrators. I’m doing all of that now,” provides Gowariker.
