Vedang Raina is young, talented, and still figuring it out

For a 20-something who, until last year, had never given an interview, Vedang Raina has a grade-A game face, even when a series of questions is thrown at him from a stranger with a phone recorder. It’s a sticky October afternoon in Mumbai, and Raina, dressed in an oatmeal sweatshirt, off-white track pants, and slippers with socks, plonks himself down on the bunk opposite me—friendly, poised, and bearing a direct gaze—as though we’ve done this a dozen times before.

His first brush with fame came in December 2023, when the Delhi-born, Mumbai-bred actor emerged as the scene-stealing breakout among the seven debutantes in Zoya Akhtar’s The Archies (2023). This week, he plays Ankur Anand, sharing screen space with Alia Bhatt in the highly anticipated Jigra, which, if things go well, could be his ticket to a whole other stratum of stardom. “I don’t think the nerves have hit yet, which is quite weird,” he says. “By this time before the last film, I was freaking out. Maybe it’ll hit me in a couple of days.”

For the unfailingly well-mannered actor, who comes across as grounded and reticent, his debut as Reginald ‘Reggie’ Mantle—a flirty, witty, narcissistic jock—may have been far from his IRL persona, but it was his Jigra role that took a fair bit out of him. Directed by Vasan Bala, the film is about a woman’s mission to jailbreak her brother who has been arrested on drug charges and put on death row in a foreign country. During the shoot, there were days when Raina would lock himself in his vanity van for hours before his call time, so that he could get into the zone to portray a young man sentenced to die. “It was more demanding for me as an actor in terms of what the story and the character were like. Reggie, I could explore more easily. Ankur, on the other hand, is someone who’s going through a lot. With this film, I felt like I’d been thrown into the deep end. Like I was all by myself and I needed to prove myself, in a way.” He does look a bit tired today, as though he’s still trying to shake off the character that has consumed him for the last six months. 

Only recently has he started getting recognised while he’s out and about in Mumbai. And he’s doing his best to prepare for a lifetime of public scrutiny. “Now that I have got a glimpse of it, a taste of it, I can say that okay, I do like it, but I don’t like certain aspects of it.” He knows he’s brimming with potential—apart from acting, he’s a gifted singer and can play the guitar. Could he sell fragrances or shoes? Could he be a haircare icon? Brands are already tapping in. He’s an ambassador for Crocs and has been in a flurry of commercials for Sprite, Suzuki, and Old Spice. His face is plastered all over Mumbai on massive billboards for Garnier’s Super UV sunscreen. He’s reserved as a person, but he’s not resisting fame.  

In all this, he’s grateful his family never hyped him up too much during his childhood. Even after he signed Jigra, his parents expected him to go to business school. “This [acting] was never the plan, to be honest. Until six months ago, my mom was like, ‘You are doing your MBA, right?’ I think now she sees that there is potential here so maybe I don’t need an MBA anymore,” he laughs. 

Raina belongs to the new club of handsome young actors in Bollywood today—sharp smile, slick hair, chiselled jawline, boyish charm—the antithesis of the traditionally hyper-masculine movie star. It’s difficult to read him in the first couple of hours of meeting him. He doesn’t fit the mould of the class clown, the Instagram-approved pookie or even the SoBo fuckboy the internet has tried to paint him as in the past (for one, he lives in Andheri). In the most sincere way, he comes across as a director’s dream—even for a light-hearted video for The Nod, he reads out what’s written on the cue cards to himself, as if rehearsing the lines or perhaps taking some time to process it.

As we break for lunch, he continues to chat between bites of rava dosa loaded with chutney, only pausing momentarily to think, as he chews his food and washes down every other bite with a gulp of Diet Coke, his meal constant. “Every single time. Just because I know it’s zero calories, I justify having it every day,” he says.

He’s serious for a 24-year-old—almost as if the quantum of work forced him to be more accelerated than most guys his age. He’s thoughtful and earnest—even though something between a smirk and a grin constantly plays on his lips. In all his responses so far, it’s evident he shares only as much as he wants to. It’s almost as if he’s already figured out how much of his private life he’s ready to trade. At times, he’ll give you stock answers. Good thing he’s got charm on his side. 

A self-confessed homebody, Raina has spent his coming-of-age years on a movie set. He auditioned for The Archies when he was 20, started shooting at 21, and even celebrated his 22nd birthday on set. “Sleep has gone for a toss. I don’t go out partying anymore. At most, I’ll do a birthday at someone’s house,” he confesses. “I am actually the lame one at a party. I like to move and groove a bit, but I am not the life of the party ever. I prefer being by myself and take a lot of time to open up.” What he does make time for is hanging out with his friends and catching up with the ‘Gu Lads’—a WhatsApp group with his PlayStation pals that is named after the Gulag in Call of Duty: Warzone. “We thought it was a very witty name, like, ‘Wow, this is genius—Gu Lads’,” he laughs. It’s refreshing to get to know his nerdy side—like the fact that he spends his day off watching movies, the most recent one being Monster, a Cannes-lauded film directed by Hirokazu Koreeda of Shoplifters fame. “It’s such a simple premise, but the beauty of the film was in the screenplay. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a film play out the way it did, the way it jumped time.”  

While he is preparing to be a leading star, he also seems genuinely interested in meaningfully evolving with his craft. Big scripts have come to him even though he says he doesn’t have the luxury of choosing from a pile right now. Both The Archies and Jigra were directed and backed by Bollywood bigwigs. Does he have an idea of what his dream role would be? “It’ll keep changing with time, but I think as of now, what I’ve always dreamed of is playing a musician. I keep saying Rockstar, like how Ranbir [Kapoor] played one. A musical drama maybe, or a biopic. Timothée [Chalamet] is playing Bob Dylan, I’m so excited for that,” he says eagerly.  While a musician’s role may not be on the cards for now, Raina has recorded two songs for Jigra: the title track and a rendition of ‘Phoolon Ka Taaron Ka’, originally sung by Kishore Kumar in Hare Rama Hare Krishna (1971). In the music video for the former, he’s onstage, fronting a band, singing to a crowd. For now, it’s close enough.  

Chalamet is a hot topic, not just around the world but also in Raina’s vanity van in this southern corner of Mumbai. “I’ll forever be envious of [him]. I think I fanboy over him more than fangirls fangirl over him,” he gushes. We chat about the Dune star’s hilarious digital footprint, including how he had YouTube channel when he was younger. “Really? So did I. I had a YouTube channel with three or four videos on it where I posted covers of songs,” Raina confides. I tell him it’s no secret; I have watched all those videos. “Awesome,” he lets out another embarrassed chuckle, sharing that the channel is also home to 50 or so unlisted videos—auditions he had done during lockdown. “I keep going back to those and I cringe at them.” I ask what would happen if they got leaked. “I’m screwed. I’ll never be cast again,” he laughs once more.  

By evening, as we continue to chat between changes, there are murmurs about our shoot location—Mukesh Mills—being haunted; the crew is being urged to wrap up before sundown. Does Raina believe in the supernatural? “I’m not afraid of ghosts, horror movies, or the dark. If you tell me to stay here alone for the night, no problem,” he says confidently, finally coming out of his shell. But if he were to cut his arm on a sharp edge in this van, all hell would break loose. “It’s so weirdly specific. I could see blood or a really crazy wound and be fine, but whenever it’s dripping or I get blood drawn for a test, something in my wiring snaps and I start feeling dizzy,” he explains. “There’s no medical reason that causes it. No, this is more of a past life thing. I was probably, like, a warrior who was scarred from killing people, because I’m fearless with everything else,” he shrugs, a hint of machismo seeping in.  

The week after our interview, Raina will be off on the Jigra promotional tour, doing press meets in front of large crowds. A lot is riding on this theatrical debut. Is this the performance that will accelerate his race to stardom and ensure he has that pile of scripts waiting for him? Time will tell, and until then, he’s enjoying the ride.

Editorial Direction: Megha Mahindru, Ridhima Sapre. Visual and Creative Director: Jay Modi. Multimedia Designer: Mehak Jindal. Hairstylist: Alistan Fernandes. Make-up Artist: Vivek Singh. Production: Imran Khatri Productions. Styling Assistant: Sabrina White. Artiste Agency: Matrix India. Artist Reputation Management: Communiqué Film PR