Ludhiana actor Nikhil Verma shares experience of working during Corona age

Ludhiana: Ludhiana-born and brought up theatre actor Nikhil Verma, who  has worked in the United States (US) and India, never knew that he would get stuck back in India after he arrived here to celebrate the new year with his family.
 
He was extremely happy and pleased with the amount of good opportunities that were coming his way in New York where he also graduated as a method actor from Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute (LSTFI), New York.
 
He finished working on an original play called ‘Look In My Eyes’ by Eddie Baca back in October, 2019 in which he played the role of a gay terrorist stuck in a moral dilemma.
 
Nikhil explains how he loved playing the part and was one of the toughest characters he worked on till date since the guy he played was so different and it became extremely difficult to relate or to find similarities between the character and himself.
 
It posed a lot of challenges and that excited the actor in him. He knew from the beginning that he will spend a good amount of time working on it which is why it took about 3 months of rehearsals and research. All of which Nikhil loved to the core.
 
‘Look In My Eyes’ is a play about a man stuck in several extremely different worlds and his quest to find and accept his own identity. After good reviews the producers decided to turn it into a feature film and planned to begin shooting early 2020 but it had to be postponed due to the existing Covid crisis.
 
Now, even though the productions are opening up, it's still much harder than what it used to be and much more expensive especially for the low budget independent productions who are not supported by big production houses.
 
Nikhil meanwhile is keeping himself busy with trying to work for local productions here in India while he waits for things to get normal so that he could finally catch a flight back to the US where he can finally get back to shooting for the film he has been rehearsing for.
Ludhiana-born Nikhil Verma always wanted to be an actor though his father wanted him to become an engineer. Nikhil started his acting career by participating in regional plays in his hometown Ludhiana. As his father desired, Nikhil studied Engineering from Ramgarhia Institute of Engineering and Technology (RIET), Phagwara. But even in his college days, Nikhil was always attracted towards his first love, acting.
 
After completing his graduation and working as an engineer for some time, Nikhil finally decided that engineering wasn’t his cup of tea. Then he packed his bags and moved to New York, US, to pursue method acting at the prestigious Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute in 2017. Three years of rigorous training at Lee Strasberg, off-broadway theatre productions, several short films and commercials later, Nikhil feels he is still learning acting skills and growing as an actor. 

Nikhil returned to India when Coronavirus started gripping the  entire world. Nikhil wanted to spend quality  time with  his  family till this pandemic gets over but he, like  others, did  not know it would take this long.
 
An optimist by nature, Nikhil hopes better days are ahead, be it getting over and  defeating Covid for the  world at  large or new acting assignments for him  and other actors like  him.

Nikhil Verma at a studio in  New York, US.