Meet Class of 83 and Ek Thi Begum season 2 actor Hitesh Bhojraj who has carved a niche for himself, delineates about his journey and challenges

By Jyothi Venkatesh

Actor, singer and theatre artiste Hitesh Bhojraj, who made his debut with Class of 83 as Vishnu Varde and was recently seen in MX Player’s Ek Thi Begum season 2 playing a Gangster named Ashwin Surve talks about the challenges of establishing himself by carving his niche and his future aspirations.

Sharing about the challenges he faced on establishing himself in the industry he says,”Since the word go, I knew what I was getting into I knew it was going to be tough, I don’t come from a film family so I had no contacts whatsoever, I believed in my hard work and my talent. It is challenging for all actors in the start, we have to face rejection on a daily basis and that rejection is very personal, one learns along the way to not let it affect you.”

His debut film Class of 83 did extremely well, when quizzed did he expect such a great debut he said,”No, I did not expect it. It was a dream debut, to be honest I had stopped thinking of lead roles at the time, I just wanted good roles, Casting director Abhimanyu Ray believed in my talent and trusted me to be one of the leads of Class of ’83 and then to top it up I got great reviews for the film so all in all it definitely was a dream come true.”

He further adds,”I don’t think the struggle ever stops, just that people stop calling an actor a struggler after that one hit. Struggle is a part of every job every business even homemakers struggle on a day to day basis, just that a working actor who does not have a big hit in his or her kitty will be termed a struggler and frankly I get very annoyed by the same.”

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The actor also shares his views on how ott boom has created a stir and things have changed, stating,”It’s a mixed bag to be honest. Initially yes it wasn’t about stars. Now post pandemic stars too are on OTT platforms and now there is one more factor that is bizarre in my opinion but is very much a trend in casting, how many followers does he /she have on social media? People are casting not on the basis of talent but followers.”

On talking about his future aspirations he says,”I want to do what I’ve done on stage for all these years that too live, act, sing and dance. I want to do a proper bollywood masala film. I also want to explore all genres as any actor would want to, but I think I will try to avoid the universe of cops and gangsters because the next that I’ve signed is again in the same universe.”

He says he is open to work in different industries like south,”I would love to explore different working environments, for me the role should excite me, if it does the language doesn’t matter, in fact I have done advertisements in Telugu and Kannada and I’ve had a lot of fun doing them.”