Actor Prakash Raj is one of the straightforward people in the Hindi film industry and in the latest interview, he didn't mince his words before expressing his take on 'movie mafia' in the entertainment industry.
Prakash will be next seen in Zee5’s spy thriller Mukhbir, as a savvy intelligence officer. Talking about what drew him to the role, he shares, “We are talking about an untold story from the 1960s when I wasn’t even born. Today, in 2022, if I am safe in this country, an unsung hero must have been somewhere responsible for it. Are we ever aware of it? There are so many things that run a nation. It is never one person, one ideology, one party, or one leader. Every person is a patriot and every person is relevant and their contributions are varied. That appealed to me.”
Many compared 'Mukhbir' to 'Raazi' for featuring story of Indian spies embedded in Pakistan. However, for the veteran actor when it comes to Mukhbir, it is not talking about two countries. "The backdrop, the structure, the skeleton is that but is when that man questions his existence and identity. I don’t think it’s similar. It’s a new way of looking at things, with a differently-sensitised script. I don’t think there will be parallels.”
He also says that the story of Mukhbir doesnt ‘bash the neighbour’ in its approach to patriotism.
“In the recent past also, we have been seeing many series or stories that are very slice of life. People are tired of the cacophony. And with the pandemic, people are connecting to more content. And when you see the fakeness is dying and the mafia is not able to convert, while there is a fair play for talent and content, it feels good. The content is becoming the king. To come out of this cacophony, this sort of effort matters," says the senior actor.
Prakash admits that he ‘keeps using the word mafia every now and then’ and he has a good reason to term certain people in the industry that.
“Cinema is a language, the most recent human language. It was like a river and it flowed but people stopped it. They put conditions on it that you should show it only in theatres and began thinking writing was only about two-and-a-half hour stories. Everybody had been stopping things like you can’t release it on TV first etc. But once the pandemic stopped this mafia, people had to go and this content came out,” says the actor.
“That’s the beauty of this medium. Earlier, I had to do certain loud films. I had to do it because there is a certain set of audience for that. My stardom is because of that. But now I don’t have to worry about it because the number of audiences is more now," adds the actor.
Directed by Shivam Nair and Jayprad Desai, the series will premiere on Zee5 from November 11.
