Naseeruddin Shah yelled at me after people applauded my back-to-back performances, says Amruta Subhash: ‘He said I would rather see you fail than…'

Indian Express

09-06-2025

Amruta Subhash, the daughter of notable Marathi actress Jyoti Subhash, is known for her roles in projects like Lust Stories 2, Sacred Games, and Gully Boy, among others. A graduate from National School of Drama, Amruta often takes part is several plays. Once, when she performed at NSD, actor Naseeruddin Shah, an alumni of the drama school was present in the audience to watch the play. Amruta was proud as her scenes garnered much praise and applause. When she performed for the second time, she noticed, this time too the veteran actor was sitting in the audience watching her performance. A proud Amruta believed she was up for great compliments from the actor. However, that was not the case.
Speaking to Lallantop, Amruta shared, 'I was doing a play called Trishna. I had a scene where I had to cry, and people would applaud that scene. That sort of gave me this feeling that 'Wow, I am doing wonders.' I was too proud of myself. Ahankaar hogaya tha (I was full of pride). Naseeruddin sir came, he watched two of my shows. He noticed people clapping for me. I was under the impression that sir is going to praise me a lot. After the show, we were all standing at a tea stall outside NSD. I saw Naseer sir walking towards me but I pretended as though I didn't see him coming at all. He came to me, and he was like, 'Amruta', I was like, 'Yes sir', and he then said, 'I watched your play' and the proud me was like, 'Okay and?' and he then said, 'Beta, I am concerned.' I was shocked. I was like I received so much applause for my work, why is he so concerned?'
ALSO READ | Sonali Bendre answers if Raj Thackeray had a crush on her 20 years ago: 'Its not in good taste when people…'
She added, 'He then told me, 'Beta, I watched both the shows and you did the same thing for claps.' He was very angry. He said in a higher tone, 'I would rather see you failing doing something new rather than doing the same thing again and again for claps, okay?' I was like, 'Okay sir, sorry'. He then gave me a lot of gyaan. He said you're forcing yourself on the character and not letting it explore anything new. You will be repetitive person. Your career will be over. That incident changed things in me. I understood where I went wrong.'
Amruta and Naseeruddin shared screens in Nandita Das' directorial debut film Firaaq (2008). Naseeruddin Shah, originally a theatre artiste, is also the founder of theatre group Motley Productions. The production house stages plays in English, Hindi and Urdu around the world.