I’m not an underdog of the industry: Emraan Hashmi

Actor Emraan Hashmi, who is gearing up for his next release Dibakar Banerjee’s “Shanghai”, says that he is tired of being tagged as an underdog in Bollywood. After delivering three back-to-back hits with “Once Upon a Time in Mumbai”, “Murder 2″ and “The Dirty Picture”, Hashmi has become one of the most bankable actors of the industry but he no longer wants to be judged for his roles.

“I have never given the right to industry to rate me or criticise me. Their criticism never bothered me. I am not an underdog. I have been fairly well rated by the audience. “People in Bollywood criticised me when I started the trend of erotica with ‘Murder’. I just did my own thing without paying attention to them. I am happy today to witness such content have become the integral part of mainstream cinema,” Hashmi told PTI. The 33-year-actor’s latest film “Jannat 2″ has not set the cash registers ringing but the actor says he would stick to his kind of cinema and not imitate the A-listers of the industry. “I always wanted to do something different. I never followed the path which Shah Rukh Khan and Aamir Khan have taken. If I would have done that then I would have lost my originality. I would prefer to fail rather than be successful by doing their kind of films,” he said.



Hashmi is hoping to score a hit and a different image with “Shanghai” where he has gone for a complete makeover with a paunch and buck tooth. “Shanghai is a massy commercial film. It’s not niche cinema anymore. It’s a fantastic film and I signed it without hearing the script. I am playing a rustic character for the first time.” Hashmi, who entered the industry at the age of 18 as an assistant director on “Raaz”, said he became an actor by chance. “I never wanted to be an actor. I was more inclined to the technical stuff. I wanted to direct a film. But, I made my debut with ‘Footpath’ because my uncle (Mahesh Bhatt) persuaded me. “I try to take up those projects where I can portray conflicting relationships and can introduce a new world to my audience,” he said.