On Going Against His Resume to Show Range
“I was completely mesmerized by the story. The fact that it actually occurred, that this young man connected with his birth mother virtually through space—it’s just baffling. I told my team, ‘This is the journey I want to go on.’ I’d been dying for a journey like this. My great managers worked on it, but I was told very early on that ‘they don’t want that goofy kid from The Best Marigold Hotel. They want someone with a bit more depth.’ I ended up rocking up to Luke Davies, the screenwriter’s, house, and I knocked on his door. They were there with a whiteboard and all these sticky notes, and I was like, ‘Hey, I want to play Saroo!’ It was a very awkward conversation where I was very politely told to go to the back of the line and send in a tape, and that’s what I did.
I sent in a tape, and Garth liked it, and we Skyped. I was in my bathroom, because that has the best reception. I was shooting a film in London with Jeremy Irons about a mathematician, and I had been working for about two months on this South Indian dialect, and they called me and told me I was going to do a screen test with Garth in a couple of days. I was in a panic, which is my usual default setting. I went in, and we explored this character, and it’s great, because I was fighting against my resume and I knew that. It’s very easy to pigeonhole someone like me, ‘Oh, he’s the usual Indian guy.’
That was specifically why I wanted this role, because actually it’s split into two. There’s a small boy struggling for survival alone on the streets of Calcutta, and then there’s a baptism, as the screenwriter described it, where I come out of the water in Australia, really adapted and one with nature. That was exciting, to play a young Australian guy, with a bit more texture, and who goes back and learns about his roots. It’s the closest a character has been to myself that I’ve ever played.”
On a Cherished Lesson from Danny Boyle
“It was a process of introspection. I spent a lot of time isolated, traveling the trains across India, just going to these orphanages alone, which I had never done before. That makes you really confront something inside yourself. Danny Boyle always said to me, during our Slumdog Millionaire days, ‘It’s very easy to come in and display attributes, but to be still, and let that camera enter you through your eyes, that’s difficult.’ I always had that in my head.”
On Being Ready to Shoot the Climatic Final Scene
“That was the first scene that I shot in the movie. You spend eight months of sleepless nights, having nightmares about this moment and how to play it, and not to overcook it, and you know it has to work. Then I flew to India three weeks early to watch this magnificent little pocket rocket, which is Sunny Pawar, and everyone on set was like, ‘Three weeks to go till the big day!’ ‘Two weeks to go!’ or ‘A couple days to go!’ We were in a really isolated space in India, and the only person I could really interact with was Priyanka Bose, who played my mother, and we really became very close. Every night after she finished filming, we would have dinner together and talk about life. Garth, a week before that shot, said, ‘I don’t want you to spend any time together. I want you alone.’ He starved us of this friendship and energy, and the day he shot that, I experienced that scene as the audience does.”
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One of the most talented groups in hollywood. The diversity is incredible and the talent they all share is greater than anything measurable. Cant wait to see what future lies ahead for this talented group of individuals. Keep up the great work!!