Trapped making: Rajkummar Rao pushes his physical limits to dangerous extremes

Vikramaditya Motwane's Trapped is already being hailed on the festival circuits for Rajkummar Rao's performance. In the latest making video of the film, the director says "As soon as I read the script, I knew we needed a solid, strong actor. As soon as I read the outline, I said, Rajkummar is the guy."

The trailer of the film caught the eyes of cinephiles with its dark recreation of an incident that could happen to anyone. As Motwane puts it, "It is the story of a man who is trapped in a high-rise building without food, water or electricity." Rao plays Shaurya who finds himself in these unfortunate circumstances. 

The plot apart, Trapped also required tremendous sacrifices for Rao as an actor. To get into his character, the actor lived on black coffee and very little water. Rao says, "I won't ever torture myself like this. I lived on a cup of black coffee and carrots, and few sips of water. I have pushed myself to my limits," he said, before adding, "but I think I enjoyed myself." 

The dedication did take a toll on his health. As the actor reveals in the video, he suffered occasional 'blackouts' due to weakness. Another huge challenge for Rao was eating non-vegetarian for the film. A lifelong vegetarian, the actor had to break this habit in order to get in sync with his character who eats rodents in order to survive in the desolate apartment. "Subconsciously, somewhere in my mind the whole experience of 30 years of my life was coming into that scene. How I don't eat non-veg. How it is not right," he says. 

Even the producer, Dipa De Motwane, admits, "Rajkummar's dedication was amazing. I used to worry, and talk to his spotboy saying 'Kucch to khilao' (feed him something)."

Yet, it did not stop the actor. He even cut himself to get the right intensity. In a scene where Shaurya, Rao's character, writes a message in his own blood, Rao cut himself to bring about the pain on screen.  

Funnily enough, the film got off to a weird start. Rao says, "On the first day of the shoot when Shaurya is stuck in the apartment, I had to try and open the door. I tried opening the door, and it actually opened."

Motwane is definitely impressed. The director says of his actor, "Rajkummar is genius. There is something so natural, so beautiful, sincere...completely natural performer, has not one false note. At no point of time does it feel like the guy is acting, or putting it down." 

Trapped is set to release on 17 March.