From Uttaran to Beintehaa and Undekhi 2, Nandish Sandhu has come a long way. The actor has also worked in several films including Girl in Red and Family of Thakurganj, among others. However, it wasn’t a cakewalk for the actor. In a recent interview with News18.com, Nandish Sandhu recalled his struggling days and revealed how it was very difficult for him when he decided to leave television for Bollywood. The actor mentioned that he had to face several rejections and was repeatedly told that he should wait before stepping into movies.
“When I was making this transition from television to films, for a very long period of time, for about two years, everyone just kept telling me that you are a television actor and for film, you have to wait or you have to forget what you have done in television. Those are the kinds of struggles that I faced. Sometimes, it did get frustrating. Sometimes, I felt like let’s go back to what I was doing,” he said.
Nandish also mentioned that repeated rejections only added to his frustration. The actor also revealed that he wasn’t getting enough work, due to which he also had to face financial issues. “I have gone through financial problems. I have gone through phases where I was frustrated because I wasn’t getting enough work or I was not getting calls for good work. It was difficult for me to reach out to people,” he added.
However, the Undekhi 2 actor also mentioned that he decided to turn his rejections into motivation. “Then I always thought that I have waited so far, let’s wait more,” he said.
Nandish also told News18.com that he did not let his frustration overpower him and that his only aim was to grow. “Rejections were a big part of my motivation because I knew when I would meet some people, they would say ‘no, you are very patient. You will do well’. My motivation was when I waited for so long, why should I waste it! I didn’t want that waiting time, that frustration to overpower and force me to go back to what I didn’t want at that point in time. I wanted to grow.”
Explaining his struggles, Nandish also mentioned that it was difficult for him to approach people during his initial career days and that dropping a WhatsApp message was not an option. “I am talking about around 2008-09, internet and social media was there but it wasn’t like how it is now. The struggle was to get meetings with people, it was difficult to approach people, to find out their numbers or call them or leave a text message. In those times, it was like, if you drop a WhatsApp message to somebody, they would take offense to it. ‘Oh, he messaged me on WhatsApp!’,” he laughed.
Adding to this, Nandish also recalled an incident when a director complaint to his manager about him sending a WhatsApp text. “If you send a WhatsApp message to a director, they would take offense. I got a complaint, from one of my managers who asked me ‘Tumne director ko WhatsApp pe message kiya (Did you send a WhatsApp message to that director)?’ I told him yes. He said,’Usko na bura lag gaya (He is offended). He did not like it. You should have sent him an SMS’. Times change! Those were the struggles at that time. One had to find ways to contact people,” he shared.
Nandish also added that it had become easier now to contact people and said, “It’s very easy now. You want to meet somebody, you want to say hi to somebody, you want to approach somebody for work, even if you don’t have a contact number, you have social media. You can tweet or send a message on Instagram. Things have become easier that way.”
“The struggles are different now. Now the struggle is how to not, get f**ked up by this negativity that is there on the internet,” Nandish concluded.
On the work front, Nandish recently made his OTT debut with the second season of Undekhi. It is a crime thriller that also stars Harsh Chhaya, Dibyendu Bhattacharya, Surya Sharma, and Anchal Singh among other actors.
