Manoj Bajpai in Drohkaal, Mithun Chakraborty in Do Anjaane, Chakravarty in Shiva, Rajpal Yadav in Shool - There have been countless such actors who knocked the doors of Bollywood as newcomers and though their initial assignments featured them in small parts, they went on to fetch bigger and better assignments in films to come.
One such newcomer who is looking at Lady Luck smiling at him in similar fashion is Siddharth Bajaj, a known name in the advertisement and television circuit, who has been noticed for his performance in the single scene that he was a part of in A Wednesday. In the film, he had a pivotal role to play as his death instigated Naseeruddin Shah, the central protagonist of this Neeraj Pandey film, to go for the kill and eradicate a bunch of terrorists.
"For me, it was the importance of the character I played in the film rather than the length of the role", says 23 year old Siddharth who has been seen in major commercials including LG and Samsung, "Though I have full on role to play in serial Champ (which airs on 'Bindaas'), it was irresistible when I was narrated the part of this young boy who is about to get married but gets killed in a train blast."
The lure of sharing a frame with Naseeruddin Shah would have been tempting as well, isn't it?
"I would be stating the obvious if I say yes, but then the fact is that in the single scene there was so much to learn from him", agrees Sidharth, "We were shooting in a moving train and there were quite a few retakes that were required. He was patient enough and kept smiling.
We had to communicate through gestures in that scene since there were no spoken dialogues involved."
Talking about his future plans, Siddharth understands that breaking into movies in a big way is not easy for an outsider like him who has left his father's pharmacy business in Delhi behind to pursue his Bollywood dreams.
"I don't like the 'struggler' tag that some pride themselves with", says Siddharth confidently, "When you step in Mumbai, you do so pretty much knowing what you are getting into.
It should be your work that speaks rather than you talking about your sob stories. I am here to make it big and it is only my hard work, which is going to take me there. Star kids have their own destiny and I have my own; I don't have any intentions ruing about that."