Not many are aware that National Award winning filmmaker Hansal Mehta is also an excellent cook and is equipped with culinary skills that are par excellence. And chef Ranveer Brar vouches for his culinary expertise. The Lucknow-born chef, who has been a popular face on TV and digital platforms with his cooking shows, makes his acting debut in Mehta’s short Baai along with Pratik Gandhi, which is a part in the upcoming Amazon Prime Video anthology Modern Love Mumbai.
Talking about his experience on the sets, Brar says, “We had a joke that Pratik is vegetarian and everything that I cook for him in the film is non-vegetarian. So Hansal sir worked on the script and on the other he also worked on the menu for what he would ask to me cook. I feel he cast me as he wanted all my recipes,” he quips.
Brar, who plays a chef in the film, reveals that the one dish over which he bonded with his director and his co-actors was Nalli Nihari. “There was a lot of cooking which happened on the sets which was not even the part of the film. I remember Hansal sir telling me, ‘Chaar ghante lagte ha Nihari bananae ko, aram se banao. Mazza aana chaiye. I am from Lucknow and our Nihari is a little soupy stew rather than thick gravy. So he made cook the dish a couple of times. A couple of days after we finished shooting, he sent me a video of him cooking Nihari. I later realised that he wanted to learn the dish (laughs).”
The chef-turned-actor says that he was always fascinated with the medium of acting which made him take the plunge. “I never thought I would act, but I always had a lot of respect for the craft. I came in mainstream television and the whole space of content. I thought I would end up directing a lot of things as I direct a lot of food documentaries so I wasn’t planning to become an actor, but the love for the medium and the ease of working with Pratik, Talaat Aziz and Hansal sir ticked all the boxes for me. I thought if not now, then never. This was the perfect opportunity, the right time.”
Brar, known for food shows like The Great Indian Rasoi, Health Bhi Taste Bhi, Breakfast Xpress and Snack Attack, mentions that doing theatre courses in the past helped him a lot, “I thought it is very difficult to act because I am used to being myself where I usually start my episodes by saying, ‘Namaskar main hoon Ranveer Brar aur aaj hum banane wale hai…’ Being Ranveer Brar is easy for me but for the film, I had to be someone else. I was scared as I didn’t want my character to take away the best of me.”
The short follows the story of a gay man (played by Pratik Gandhi) who grew up in a conservative household and is torn between the love for his partner Rajveer played by Brar, and his ailing and ever doting grandmother Baai (Tanuja Chandra).
Brar says that he didn’t have any qualms in playing a gay character. “I don’t think we should judge the audience as I believe they are open to experimenting new things. I remember one of my Ustadjis would tell me, ‘Agar aap grahak pe chodoge toh duniya ke sab menu ek page main khatam ho jayega.’ The audience has limited knowledge, it is we as performers who need to give them variety. This story is about love. It is a very sensitive story. You can replace the male character with a female one or have two female characters. It is just the love in their eyes that matters,” he says.
The chef believes that there are a lot of similarities between cooking and acting. “Cooking is about expressing yourself on a plate. Similarly, acting is about expressing yourself in front of the audience through a different medium. We use our hands in the art of making food whereas it is all about facial expressions when it comes to the art of acting,” he concludes.
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