Kunal Kapoor

Early life

Kapoor was born in Mumbai to a Punjabi family whose origins are in Amritsar. In February 2015, he married Naina Bachchan, niece of Amitabh Bachchan, at a private family ceremony in Seychelles.

Career

Kapoor trained for an acting career under Barry John, and became a part of Motley, a theatre group run by acting legend Naseerudin Shah He began his career as an assistant director of Aks, which starred Manoj Bajpayee and in which Amitabh Bachchan played a major character role, but eventually moved on to be a movie actor.

Kapoor made his movie debut as the male lead opposite Tabu in Meenaxi: A Tale of Three Cities (2006) which was helmed by painter MF Hussain. His next film was the Aamir Khan starrer Rang De Basanti (2006), for which he received a nomination in the Filmfare Best Supporting Actor Award category. The film was successful both critically and commercially, and it was nominated in the Best Foreign Film category at the 2007 BAFTA Awards.

Kapoor subsequently got signed by Yash Raj Films (YRF) studio for a three-film contract. He appeared in films like Laaga Chunari Mein Daag (2007), Aaja Nachle (2007) and Bachna Ae Haseeno (2008). After this, Kapoor took a break for two years, and appeared next in national award winner Rahul Dholakia's Lamhaa (2010) starring Sanjay Dutt. The film didn't do well but Kapoor received accolades for his performance as a young Kashmiri politician. Critics hailed it as "One of the most powerful performances of the year" That same year, Kapoor voiced the Indian God Rama in Mahayoddha Rama, an animation film made by Raizada Rohit Jaising Vaid. In 2011, he appeared in the Shahrukh Khan starrer Don 2, where his performance was appreciated.

In 2012, Kapoor played the lead role in Sameer Sharma's light-hearted comedy film Luv Shuv Tey Chicken Khurana. A film that he co-wrote. The film received positive reviews and was hailed by the critics as being amongst the ten best films of the year. The New York Times reviewed it favourably and called Kapoor the Indian Matthew McConaughey. In 2014, he appeared in the off-beat comedy film Kaun Kitne Paani Mein.

Kapoor has three films up for release. The epic action tri lingual film, Veeram, directed by National Award winner Jayaraj, Gauri Shinde's next and Tigmanshu Dhulia's war drama Raagdesh based on the INA trials. In 2017 he started filming for one of the most expensive Indian movie's GOLD The film based on the first Indian hockey team to win a Gold at the Olympics will see him pairing up with Akshay Kumar for the first time. It is slated for a release on Independence Day in 2018.

Next year he will start filming for two projects including a film by Anurag Kashyap, where he will play India's biggest comic book superhero Doga, who features in Raj Comics. He will also appear in Chamkila, a biography of controversial Punjabi singer Amar Singh Chamkila for which he will begin filming in early 2018. He is also writing two films, which are expected to go on next year.

Other work

Kapoor has endorsed popular brands like Thums Up, Indian Terrain, Ray-Ban, Mahindra Logan and Save the Children charity along with Gwyneth Paltrow.

In 2009, Kapoor started writing weekly columns for HT City, the lifestyle supplement of the Hindustan Times. These columns ended in November 2009 but still appear online on the social network Desimartini.

He is also a trained pilot, and rally car driver. In 2014, he started training for the Formula Three. He is also known to be a tech geek and co founded Asia's largest crowdfunding platform called Ketto, which raises money for social and individual causes. To date, the platform has raised close to one billion rupees. He is also known for his style. And has constantly been voted amongst the most stylish men in the country. Recently he was on GQ's list of the top ten stylish men in the country.

Awards