Cinema has created stereotypes, says Pankaj Tripathi

Pankaj Tripathi has been playing all his roles with utmost perfection, be it that of a criminal in ‘Mirzapur’ and ‘Gangs of Wasseypur’ or that of an emotional father in ‘Bareilly Ki Barfi’ and ‘Gunjan Saxena’. All his roles, to this day, have been based in the heartland of the country and the audience has barely seen him as a royal or a rich character. But this is not by choice. Tripathi believes he is equally capable of achieving a ‘posh’ role if given an opportunity. However, he mentioned in a recent interview that in cinema, people tend to stereotype and box actors into particular roles based on their looks.

While interacting with a leading media house, Tripathi insisted on ‘changing the perspective of cinema’. He said, “In cinema, we have made a stereotype that a doctor looks like this and an engineer looks like that. During auditions, a brief is written even for the junior artists like ‘rich look, corporate look’. We have divided the world based on looks. We imagine Katrina Kaif in the role of a doctor. But you go to Delhi’s AIIMS. How many Katrinas will you find there?”

To explain further, Tripathi quoted the example of one of India’s biggest industrialists.