In theatre, just like in life, there are no retakes.” The fact that in theatre an actor stands bare, performing live in front of an audience, makes it the toughest form of acting as it comes without retakes and almost no frills of enhancing your stardom. Theatre artists learn to work as a team right from the beginning and they have no fear of facing a live audience. Some of these theatre artists have made it big and here are a few of the recent ones:

Jim Sarbh: Before wowing us on the big screen in Neerja, he worked in plays like Alque Padamsee’s 2013 revival of Death of a Salesman, Rajat Kapoor’s What’s Done is Done, The Glass Menagerie, Vickram Kapadia’s The Merchant of Venice and Kalki Koechlin’s Living Room.

Rajkummar Rao: After great career-defining performances in movies like Newton, Bareilly Ki Barfi , Rajkummar Rao is considered as one of the great actors in Bollywood. During his time in Delhi University, Rao was actively working in theatre with Kshitij Repertory and Shri Ram Centre.

Richa Chadda: Richa Chadda has carved a niche for herself in Bollywood, and she’s no stranger to the stage either. After playing some supporting roles in a few plays about 5-6 years ago, she hit it big by appearing in Trivial Disasters alongside Kalki Koechlin and Cyrus Sahukar.

Radhika Apte: Apte was associated with Mohit Takalkar’s theatre troupe Aasakta in her hometown of Pune. She appeared in various Marathi plays like ‘ Tu ‘, ‘ Purnaviram ‘, ‘ Matra Ratra ‘, ‘ Kanyadaan ‘ and Samuel Beckett’s ‘ That Time ‘ with Rehan Engineer.

Huma Qureshi: This young actor has a professional theatrical background. She has worked with several theatre directors like NK Sharma, Sohaila Kapur, Aamir Raza Husain and Rahul Pulkeshi.

These are a few actors who were theatre artists and made it to Bollywood.