I decided to not eat, to give up proper meals: Rajkummar Rao's prep for Trapped

Rajkummar Rao isn't a prankster, he says. And yet he enjoys pretending that the mic isn't working. On being asked to test the mic, he whispers, "Testing, testing".

Amused at his little prank, Rao shares, "I do that a lot with my sound guy. He'll be like, 'Rolling, sir'. And I'll whisper. Then he says, 'Sir, problem sir, I dunno sir, awaaz nahi ayi."

The central actor, in fact the only actor for large chunks of Vikramaditya Motwane's latest Trapped, Rajkummar Rao confesses that it didn't come easy.

"I had to go through a lot for this character. It was very demanding," he tells Catch. "I knew from the start that I can't use any shortcut to play Shaurya – my character. He's somebody who's stuck without food and water. As an actor, it's my responsibility to go through the same process in order to give you the kind of truth you'd like to see on screen."

And for discipline, acting integrity, or something on those lines, Rao practically starved himself.

"So I decided to not eat, give up proper meals, food and water. I was just having a cup of black coffee, and a carrot for lunch," he says nonchalantly.

Surely that drive to starve for a character must be why critics adore him? "People can connect to what I play. They feel I'm one of them," says Rao, on his USP. "I can show them reality on the screen."