Actor Nitu Chandra Shrivastav made her debut with Garam Masala and since then she has been a part of some interesting films like Traffic Signal, Oye Lucky Lucky Oye, Rann among others. Last year the actor made her Hollywood debut with Never Back Down: Revolt. Nitu was seen doing some high-octane action sequences which have garnered her a lot of appreciation.
In an interaction with us, Nitu spoke about bagging two more Hollywood projects, deriving confidence from her own struggles, and how she is open to working anywhere in the world.
Last year, you made your Hollywood debut with Never Back Down: Revolt. Are there any offers that have come your way?
Yes, I am doing two Hollywood projects. The first one is again in the genre of action in which my character is almost like a superwoman (Laughs). We expect to start rolling in May. The other is a horror film. I have been receiving many offers but I am not interested in doing two-minute roles or making cameo appearances. There have been films where they’ve done a two-minute or a five-minute role. But they were hugely publicised and hyped, and the audiences were promised something big. And since we, Indians, are very emotional, we were disappointed after watching those films. I have got many offers like that but I refused to take it up.
How was the experience of working on a Hollywood project?
I have explored myself as an actor, and I have evolved as a human being. I have understood the power of forgiveness. In fact, throughout my journey, I have been trolled but that has just made me mentally strong. I have come to the terms where I am aware that people aren’t going to stand by me but I am going to stand with myself and do the kind of work that I want to do. I find happiness and confidence in smaller things. Also, there is an immense sense of confidence, pride and a motivating factor that coming from Bihar, if I can go to Hollywood, anybody can.
Does that confidence also come from the fact that you turned producer a few years back and made two films ‘Deswa’ in Bhojpuri and ‘Mithila Makhaan’ which also won the Best Maithili Film at the 63rd National Film Awards?
It started from my childhood days. I was a sportsperson throughout my school and college life. I was the school’s sports Champion for four consecutive years. I started with winning Gold medals in 3 different games; Cycling, Athletics, and Taekwondo at district level championships at Bihar State level tournaments. I also five Gold Medals in Taekwondo from 1990 to 1996 and also was honoured with Bihar Sarkar Khel Samman in Patna 1997 – 98 for representing India at World Taekwondo Championship in Hongkong, in 1997 where I was appreciated as one of the most promising players of Jackie Chan. But it was Delhi that changed my life where I did my college. Everyone would call me a Bihari but I took it as a lot of pride. When I was in Delhi University, one of the HoDs threw all my certificates on my face saying ‘Bihar main toh certficates bikte hai.’ These won’t be counted and you won’t get a room in the hostel. This incident changed everything for me.
I practised my basketball and became the captain of my college team and went to win the University Basketball Championship. Every college and hostel was offering me a space. I took the letters and showed them to the same head of the department who had rejected me. It was my brother Nitin Chandra who decided to make films based on our roots. We made a Bhojpuri film which went to 37 international film festivals. Our Maithili language film won so many accolades.
But was there a particular reason that you decided to make films in your mother tongue?
My brother has previously assisted Tanuja Chandra and Dibakar Banerjee and was offered to make Hindi films but we decided not to. It is because films in Bihari or Bhojpuri languages are only related to double meaning or soft porn and cheap kind of films keeping the auto walas in my mind. No Bhojpuri family would watch such films. We decided to start our production house Champaran Talkies and decided to make some good meaningful films. The money was going through our pockets but we were ready to do it as it was for something special.
Are there any offers coming in from Bollywood?
I want to do something out of the box and want to stand out and do something authentic. I was getting offers in Bollywood too but I kept saying no as I couldn’t connect to it. I don’t want to do double-meaning cheap comedy films which were very easy to get. But yes, you will soon hear something as I am in talks. I don’t come from any background. I am just thankful to God to get me to work irrespective of the country and language. My idea is to work on a global platform. I did a Greek film Block 12 in 2016 too where I did a lot of action. I am also in talks for a Korean drama series which I will start working on soon.
