76th Cannes Film Festival: Actor Rahul Bhat on filmmaker Anurag Kashyap's Kennedy, and working with Sunny Leone

Kennedy is Anurag Kashyap and Rahul Bhatt's third film together, after Ugly and Dobaara.

Rahul Bhat has just got his clothes sorted and is counting down to walking the red carpet at the upcoming Cannes Film Festival (May 16-27, 2023). His latest role is as a cop-turned-killer in filmmaker Anurag Kashyap’s noir thriller Kennedy, which will have its world premiere as part of the Midnight Screenings section of the 76th edition of the French film festival.

Kennedy

This will be Bhat’s second appearance at Cannes. Kashyap and Bhat had earlier collaborated on Ugly, which screened at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. Yet Bhat believes the 2023 experience will be more special. Read on to find out why the TV actor-turned-movie actor thinks so.

What can you share about the film and your character?

Kennedy is a film about an ex-cop who is supposed to be dead. But he's alive, and he's still working for the system. And now he's like a hitman, doing the wrong job. So, the film is about this guy and his personal redemption and what he wants in life. He is looking for something and finally gets it. So, it is his emotional redemption also. In Anurag’s films people are just people and they are gray, mostly. Kennedy is ruthless, but at the same time, he has his regular emotional qualities about him that make you feel for him at the end.

You went through a lot to get into the part of Rahul Kapoor in ‘Ugly’. What was the prep for getting into the part of Kennedy?

The physical part was not tough for me, although he (Kashyap) told me to bulk up a lot. Actually, first Anurag told me let's make him like a ghost. You should be thin. I was working on becoming thin when he told me, no, I think you should bulk up. You should be huge. So, I started bulking up and I became almost 90 kg for the film. Apart from that, the most difficult part was to get into Kennedy's mind, which has taken a toll on me actually. All my friends say we have spent a year with Kennedy. Now can you get him out of your system! Although he's huge, he's almost invisible. Although he has so much violence in him and has a million things going on in his mind, yet he's very calm. At that time, I was also going through a lot in my personal life. Anurag has a way of always pushing me into the well, deep into the abyss. He was also going through his own emotional turmoil. Plus, it was COVID times and we had to dive really deep into this abyss and carry it for almost a year with me. I would say that it definitely was the most difficult role I have played till now and it took a lot for me to get him out of my system.

How did you shake him off?

I was so deep into him; I almost had an emotional breakdown. I cried a lot after this film. This character really broke me into pieces. This character is wild and ruthless. He blames the world for his issues and the world blames him. It’s a very tough thing. It took me a while to get out of it, but now I am almost out of it and back into my rhythm. With Kennedy, I had also changed my voice and was talking differently for almost one year.

What, according to you, is the importance of a festival like Cannes and this screening?

Ugly was in Director’s Fortnight, which is a very prestigious event, but it's not a big red-carpet event. This film is going to be shown in the Grand Auditorium Louis Lumiere, their main theatre and it is a proper red-carpet event. What happens with a Cannes selection is that it gives you a very good feeling that out of 1000s of films from all over the world, the jury has selected only 20 and you are among that 20. That is a huge validation. The second thing is that as an actor you want to walk the bloody red carpet, yeah! It’s the same carpet that Martin Scorsese is walking on. That feeling that it can't get bigger than this. It’s something to tell your children.

One of the very interesting things about this film is the casting of Sunny Leone. What was it like working with her?

She's so good in the film. You know, acting is not the privilege of a few. We are all actors. We just don't have to realize it, but we are all acting every single day. The difference is performing in front of a camera. Sunny is great in the film and she is a very good human being. She doesn’t come on set without any inhibitions as an actor. She’s receptive, open and a thorough professional. Now I feel only she could have been Charlie. She brings that oomph and looks gorgeous. It was great working with her.

Rahul Bhat in Kennedy

This is the third time you are working together after ‘Ugly’ and ‘Dobaara’. Why do you think he casts you in these dark films?

When I read the script for the first time, it was a page-turner. I could not put it down. I started crying. And tears were like flowing out and I'm wondering why am I crying? I realized I was crying because Anurag actually thought that I could pull this off. As an actor, I do very less work. Whenever I take a film, I want to own that character. And I was thinking, you know, in every actor's life, the biggest compliment is when the director thinks of a very complex character, and he thinks that actor can pull it off. So yes, my tears were tears of joy. And as for Anurag, he mostly makes only dark films.

When you work with a director, you develop that chemistry, a divine bond which happens sometimes. Lajos Egri writes in his book The Art of Dramatic Writing that there are three things that develop a character: psychology, physiology and sociology. But with Anurag and me, I feel there is a fourth thing: theology. It's the spirit and soul of that. In our relationship, I surrender to him, believing the water will take you on its correct course, to the ocean. Just leave yourself. Don't try to do something extra. And if I go off course, he nudges me back on course.

As you said, you don’t do a lot of work. Why not take on more acting jobs? And how would you like to expand your range?

I think it is my stupidity that I have not worked more. I should be working more and I have decided to work more now. I think I'm seven-eight movies behind. So, I have to catch up. There are certain things in the pipeline, which will start when I come back from Cannes. I would love to do a comedy. I got such good reviews for my comic timing in Dobaara. I would love to do a romance. I would love to do a long-form piece where you can explore a character for a longer time and show different facets of that character.