Anyone in theatre will tell you: backstage is often just a pit stop on the way to the spotlight. But even veteran producer Shernaz Patel didn’t see this one coming.
Mid-rehearsal of their 2012 play The Bureaucrat, one of her crew—a “tall, nice-looking guy, fantastic backstage worker”—came up to her and politely said he needed to leave early. For a shoot.
“No one had any idea he was already starting his acting career,” says Patel, co-founder of the theatre company Rage Productions. “I mean, we all knew he wanted to act. But we were a little clueless.”
The backstage guy eventually bowed out of the 2012 production—but not before a quick turn under the lights. “There was a joke we had in The Bureaucrat—somebody couldn’t make it, so he played a small, one-line part for a couple of shows,” recalls director Rahul Da Cunha. “He had one line. The character calls himself ‘Shera’ and just says, ‘Ayyy Shera.’ Hundreds of crores later, for me, he’ll always be that guy.”
Da Cunha isn’t far off. In many ways, Vicky Kaushal is still that guy.
Once lanky, now a commanding six-foot-two with a 42-inch chest and 16-inch biceps. A lot surer of himself, and fresh off a blockbuster—Chhaava, his rendition of Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj, which, as of March 18, had raked in ₹523 crore, according to Box Office India. On February 19, a day before Esquire India’s cover shoot in Mumbai’s Bandra, Kaushal was at Raigad Fort, marking the 395th birth anniversary of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. Political heavyweights—Aditi Tatkare, Maharashtra’s Minister for Women and Child Development, and former MLA Anil Tatkare—were there to greet him. By evening, he was in Agra, landing back in Mumbai just hours before call time.
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Four, maybe five hours of sleep. Another packed day ahead. As far as we were concerned, he was king of the set. And yet, just as he had 13 years ago, he made a quiet, polite request: “I’ll have to leave a little early.”
His world had changed. The guy hasn’t.
‘Good Guy' may sound vanilla—safe, even—but in a world where kindness surprises and character is constantly under scrutiny, it’s a quietly powerful compliment.
Patel and Da Cunha both highlight Kaushal’s grounded nature. “I think Vicky comes from humility,” notes Da Cunha, while Patel says, “Even today, if I message him, I’ll immediately get a reply.”
“There is not a bad bone in his body. He’s a beautiful soul,” is how his Manmarziyaan (2018) director Anurag Kashyap describes him. Filmmaker Meghna Gulzar, who has worked with him on Raazi (2018) and Sam Bahadur (2024), adds, “There’s a rootedness to Vicky; there’s no posturing or façade. That simplicity can catch you off guard—you wouldn’t expect it from an actor.”
Kaushal seems momentarily taken aback by their words. Then, with eyes crinkling, he flashes his signature smile—the kind that lights him up from within. “I don’t know how to respond to that, but it’s nice to hear,” he admits. Pausing to reflect, he adds, “A lot of who we become as adults stems from our childhood. For my mom and dad, it wasn’t about raising good men—it was about raising good human beings.”
These were the same values that Kaushal’s father, action director Sham Kaushal, brought with him to Mumbai in 1978. Despite facing financial hardships and Kaushal senior’s battle with stomach cancer, the family weathered it all and remains a tight-knit unit to this day. “I never hid anything from them,” Kaushal senior shared in a YouTube interview, referring to his sons, Vicky and his younger brother Sunny. “When I felt insulted or humiliated, I came home and cried—they saw it all.”
Reflecting on his upbringing, Kaushal feels grateful for the openness his family shared. “I saw my parents in vulnerable moments, but they’ve also been my pillars of strength. They made me strong by not letting me indulge feelings of weakness or fragility. In a strange, beautiful way, they always lifted my brother and me up during tough times—as only parents can do.”
He credits his parents for making him resilient to failure, thanks to their attitude, for instance, toward his academic performance, from an early age. “As a kid, your biggest fear was, ‘Am I going to score enough marks?’ But my parents always freed me from that pressure,” he recalls. The Kaushal boys were told that as long as they were working hard and giving their best, it was all that mattered. “They [parents] said, ‘That’s good enough for us, and it should be for you, too’.”
It’s a mindset that has stayed with him, even now, as an adult in a highly competitive industry where every film can make or break you. “I can’t tell you how much strength that gives me because it allows me to focus on giving my best. Then, I leave it to destiny,” he says.
Could that be why those close to him feel he’s always understood that success is fleeting? Perhaps. Or maybe it’s another lesson rooted in his father’s journey. “The good things—don’t take them for granted. And the bad things—don’t take them too seriously, because they’re all a phase. You live through it. But don’t treat anything frivolously,” Kaushal says, offering wisdom well-earned by age 36.
The actor's grasp of life’s impermanence runs deep. His debut film as a lead actor, Masaan (2015), earned the FIPRESCI Award and the Promising Future prize in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival—and The Hollywood Reporter described him as “perfectly cast” and “romantically good-looking”.
But long before that, he walked the Manikarnika Ghat in Varanasi, watching flames reduce bodies to ash. He recalls reflecting on the transient nature of life: dust we are, and to dust we shall return.
"Deepak's journey taught me to consider where they’ve come from and what they’ve endured,” he says of his Masaan character, who hails from the Dom community, a Dalit caste tasked with funeral rites. “For a boy born and raised in the safe, protective cocoon of a family and city like Mumbai, it was a reality check.”
Da Cunha believes this awareness of privilege is one of Kaushal’s greatest strengths. “Vicky has the perfect blend—he comes from Bollywood, but not as an actor. He understands the hardness of what’s required, what nepotism means, and what it takes to get a start in Bollywood.”
His rise—and rise—has felt almost inevitable. Acclaimed directors have sought him out with compelling scripts, firmly convinced of his acting prowess (his next is with Sanjay Leela Bhansali). Coincidentally, in his selection of roles, the actor has taken on an inordinate number of biopics—has that been a deliberate choice? He pauses, reflecting on the question. “You know, be it Sam Manekshaw sir, Sardar Udham, Chhatrapati Sambhaji Maharaj, or even characters like Major Vihaan Singh Shergill in Uri or Deepak from Masaan—I feel what they’ve achieved in their lives is truly heroic, and I’m deeply drawn to the opportunity to bring their untold stories to light.”
For Kaushal, who once admitted to struggling with an inferiority complex because of his lanky frame, those days are firmly behind him. “When I was in my early 20s, the perception of a hero was very different. You had to look a certain way to play a certain kind of role. Only then were you considered a true-blue leading hero in Bollywood.”
Over time, audience expectations have evolved—and so has Kaushal’s confidence. His growing self-assurance, he explains, comes from introspection. “It’s about finding true authenticity— figuring out who I am and how I can bring that to the table,” says the actor, whose signature hook step from the chart-topping Tauba Tauba cemented his mainstream appeal.
From vulnerability in Manmarziyaan to quiet rage in Uri: The Surgical Strike (2019) and a towering presence in Chhaava, Kaushal’s focus has always been on staying true to the character. “For a part like Chhaava, where you have to look like a beast, you aim for that. But now, if you have a role like mine in [Bhansali’s] Love and War, where I’ll need to drop a lot of weight, I will do that. All that inferiority is a thing of the past for me,” he states.
He delivered the blockbuster—an accomplishment that could easily boost any male actor’s ego. But Kaushal takes a different approach, staying detached from his successes and crediting the whole team for the win. “I won’t lie—it’s a great feeling to make a mark when it’s something you’re always chasing, but it’s a little dangerous to get fully consumed by it,” he admits.
Kaushal has held fast to his values, and that's perhaps the secret behind his journey—one that has brought him not only success but a life partner. “Whenever there’s a new project—whether personal or professional—I approach it without fear of the result,” he shared earlier. But when it came to Katrina Kaif, he admits initially, he had his doubts. The two have never done a film together—he first met the superstar at an awards ceremony in 2019, which he was co-hosting, but they truly hit it off when they met again later, at a mutual friend’s place. Kaif has called their relationship “unexpected” on Koffee With Karan, and Kaushal told podcast host Nikhil Taneja, “I found it odd that I got attention from her. Initially, I thought, ‘Why me?’”
From the start, though, a smitten Kaushal knew he wanted her as a life companion. When the couple married in December 2021, their wedding was the subject of substantial media coverage, not just because Katrina Kaif, the box-office empress and on-screen Aphrodite, was getting married, but also due to the intense secrecy surrounding the event. Google searches for Vicky Kaushal peaked on December 9, 2021, with wedding photography searches shooting up by 500%. His Instagram post that day, being garlanded by Kaif, has over 7.6 million likes. Hers? 12.2 million.
“She was—and still is—a phenomenon. It’s just now that the human side of her has emerged, and I find myself even more in awe,” Kaushal said to Taneja.
While the charming actor is often hailed as the dream husband and a ‘green flag man’—proudly supporting Kaif’s success, recognising the work they need to do as a couple and valuing their individuality—he’s wary of labels, preferring to go by his instincts. “I just do what comes right to me as a human being,” he says. “That naturally leads to being a good son, brother and husband. I won’t say that I’m the most perfect, but one keeps learning and evolving.”
Though their relationship has its public moments—snapped by the paparazzi or Instagram posts they choose to share—Kaushal reiterates that outsiders will never fully understand the essence of what they share. He explains, “When two people get married, you connect with each other at a very core level, and you love each other from that deep place. From an outside perspective, there will be different views, but for us, who are living this journey, it’s a very personal and sacred kind of truth.”
And as for what it was about him that won Kaif over? Kaushal laid it bare on that podcast: “She told me, ‘You have a set of values I admire, and you stand by and protect them’.”
Looks like his parents’ advice hit home.
“I’m at my best when my conscience is clear and I’m sleeping well—not worried about facing anyone and happy with how life is going. It’s all about keeping things simple and staying clear-headed,” he says. “I truly feel blessed with how things are going in life, and I believe God is putting me in situations where everything is falling into place.”
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