Bollywood needs fresh talent: Director Abhishek Kapoor (Interview)

New Delhi, June 29 (IANS) After proving his mettle with "Rock On!!", Abhishek Kapoor wears the director's cap for "Kai Po Che" again and says he consciously chose newcomers over big stars for the film because he wanted to execute the story without any changes. The director feels the industry needs more fresh talent.

"Kai Po Che", the big screen adaptation of Chetan Bhagat's book "3 Mistakes of My Life", features TV actors Sushant Singh Rajput, Amit Sadh and Rajkumar Yadav with Amrita Puri the female lead.

"Big stars come with a lot of baggage. There are things they don't want to do," Kapoor told IANS in an interview.

"This (film) is a story about three young boys and big stars in this bracket are at a stage in their career where they are not sure. They are scared about who will be cast opposite them...they think about all these things. I don't want to do that, I don't want to change my script because I am casting a big star," he added.

"I think our industry can do with young people, we hardly have anyone. There are two or three people who are getting all the work. What would other people do? It is important that new people get a chance. The three actors in my film are fantastic. All the big stars were also newcomers at some time," he said.

Kapoor, who won a National Award for 2008 film "Rock On!!", discloses that Chetan Bhagat had offered him two of his books - "2 States: The Story of My Marriage" and "3 Mistakes of My Life". He chose to go with the latter.

"I thought this had great cinematic potential. I felt if it turns out to be a good film it will be remembered forever. There is so much in it: there's love, friendship, politics and cricket," said Kapoor.

Drafting the screenplay of "Kai Po Che", a victory cry heard during the kite festival in Gujarat, took a lot of time.

"I took some time off after 'Rock On!!', then I chose the book. It took a while for me to draft it. It's not a race, I took my time and developed two new scripts," said Kapoor.

"As a book it goes into different directions, so to make a movie out of it you have to draft it differently. A very serious process goes into adapting a book for a film. We have changed it around 50 percent," he added.

After the stupendous success of "Rock On!!", expectations from "Kai Po Che" are high. But Kapoor is unperturbed.

"This is a completely new film. I have no fear of expectations. I know when you will come and watch the film, you will forget 'Rock On!!'. There is no similarity, it has a different style and I have also learned a lot while working on it," he said.

(Priyanka Sharma can be contacted at priyanka.s@ians.in)