Manoj Bajpayee Quotes

One of the things that I found very confronting in my early working life was that people thought I was some sensitive doe-eyed lovelorn boy, because they'd seen me do that a couple of times. What tends to happen is you get a run of similar roles.

Is typecasting really a problem?

I don't tend to get cast in the theatre much. People assume I come with all this baggage. But they do cast me in films. In films, I'm a nobody.

I was victimized by the old Hollywood typecasting thing. I had to really fight to get out of it, so I was uncomfortable with it.

I think I was pigeonholed pretty early on. And I started late in my career. I was 33.

I think it's pretty crazy to say you've been typecast at the age of 20 before you've even really started getting going.

People look at me, they know I've appeared in costume dramas and they automatically assume I must be a Tory, I must be a certain type of person.

I'm trying to fight typecasting as hard as I can, while I have time.

It's upsetting that it is such a big deal. I wish it weren't an issue all the time. It's funny that people say it's a departure, because I've been acting since I was a child. I've played three gay roles out of hundreds.

I just get so fed up with seeing the same things written about me. If I see the words 'ice queen' attached to me, I feel like banging my head against the wall. There's this perception that I can only be in a film if I have a glass of champagne in my hand and a stately home in the background.

I give two hoots about being typecast. It's not in my hands.

People figure because I'm blonde and was a model, I just waltzed into Los Angeles and got major roles in major films.

I think that I've been pigeon-holed by virtue of the fact that I've spent so much time in front of a green screen.

In England or America, actors do not have to cater to an image. In India, it is almost demanded of us. Very seldom do you get a film where you can walk away from your image.

To be completely honest, it's shocking to me that I keep getting the villain roles! I do not see myself as the villain and I know, growing up, I was the opposite of a villain. I would never try to be a villain to anyone - but maybe other people I grew up with feel differently about that.

You're always being cast for what you've been in last.

People decided that I was the frat guy, even though I've never been inside a fraternity, or the guy who beat them up at school, even though that wasn't me at all.

Fortunately and unfortunately, people don't see me as a character actor. They see me as a leading man or nothing, which makes it really hard to get work.

Hollywood constantly wants to label you and type you into a certain category, 'Oh he's a comedy guy,' or the weirdo character guy or the villain.

Once you become tagged as anything, it becomes difficult to shake it, because the less imaginative people in the business want you to do what worked for the last guy. That's always been something I've had to deal with.

I keep getting cast as this bad guy, and I don't know why.

As a young actor, I played a lot of 'exotic' parts and was stuck with the tag 'sultry.' I had to refuse such parts if I were ever to play anything else. It did the trick, but my agent feared it made me harder to cast.

When you have a label stuck on you, people tend to believe it. If someone calls you suave and debonair, you only get offered parts in a suit and a collar and tie. It just so happens I wear them reasonably well.

I think there's a danger of a being typecast as the all-American mom forever.

I think I have been stereotyped as an action director in Hollywood, so all I got were the action scripts.