Gohar Rasheed fits into his roles like a hand in a glove; maybe that’s why he always gets the role of the antagonist in TV dramas and films. But he has only one request from his fans: ‘Please don’t judge my personality based on my on-screen characters.’
In an interview with BBC Urdu, the Mann Mayal actor narrates an incident where he was harassed by women when he went to the cinema with his friends.
“I went to the cinema with a couple of friends and there were a few older women standing nearby. One of them came up to me, and asked, ‘You’re Mikael, right?, and I said ‘yes.’ Just then in all seriousness, she said, ‘You’re a bad person’ and the other woman standing behind her said, ‘Please leave this place otherwise we’ll slap you’, and had I stayed there a few moments longer, I would’ve probably gotten a slap.”
Previously, Gohar had said that his character Mikael in TV drama Mann Mayal can also be seen in our society, which is why his character is so relateable to the audience.
“When the drama aired, I received messages from women on my Facebook page and profile saying, ‘Thank you so much for playing your character so well, our ex-husbands used to behave exactly like that; mistreating us while we used to sit naively and thinking no, he is my husband, there was also the societal pressure. Now after watching Mann Mayal we realise we were only ill-treating ourselves. Thank you so much for playing this role and you’re a terrible person’.”
After having been cast in numerous negative roles, the actor has started fearing that he is being typecast, “In our industry we have a lot of heroes, and whoever [enters the field] comes to become a hero.”
And he doesn’t want to be a hero? No, is his reply, he doesn’t want to be a hero.
“All the pappu boys in our industry, who don’t know how to act and are still acting, who are not here on merit, I dislike them immensely,” he adds, while refusing to take names.
During the Q&A, Gohar was asked If he were ever offered a role in a movie along the lines of Brokeback Mountain, would he take it. “If I’m offered the role in Pakistan, it’s going to a problem, if it’s being offered abroad I still wouldn’t do it [ laughs],” he replied.
However, upon mentioning that Fawad Khan had played a gay man in Kapoor And Sons, Gohar changed his statement.
“Fawad did a commendable job. It’s all about the treatment of the role. If I got a role like Fawad did in Kapoor & Sons, then sure I’ll do it, I’ll have no qualms, but not something like Brokeback Mountain.”