Debutant Ranveer Singh is a star in the making. Seema Sinha meets the confident performer

TIMES NEWS NETWORK (TIMES LIFE; February 20, 2011)

MEET Ranveer Singh, the star in making, with floppy hair falling on his forehead, the casual college boy looks. The debutant, who made inroads into Bollywood’s big banner Yash raj with his very first film — Band Baaja Baaraat, has emerged winner with the box-office success and several awards already in his kitty. Bollywood’s top honchos Shah Rukh Khan and Karan Johar have predicted him as the next superstar!

However, his striking resemblance to rising star Ranbir Kapoor is purely incidental, he maintains. “It’s just our names that are similar. I’m an experimental actor and want to carve my own niche,” he says.

Ranveer had celluloid dreams from the time he finished high school. He says, “It all seemed so farfetched then. Given my non-filmi background, I felt like an outsider, who didn’t stand a chance. It was like wanting to belong to an elite, exclusive club.”

The next best thing was to take up copywriting, says Ranveer, who grew up on a steady diet of television. “As a kid, I was fat. When children were playing outside, I spent my time in front of the television, enjoying commercials and wondering how they were made. I was good at writing jingles and one-liners. I interned at O&M, but my love for cinema never died,” he reminisces.

His dream was fulfilled when the casting director at More >