Speaking ahead of his Netflix series Operation Safed Sagar, Jimmy Shergill sheds light on the struggle of industry workers who arrive hours before actors and leave much later, turning a 12-hour shoot into an 18-hour grind. He warns that such schedules endanger health, insisting that life is about more than money and that work ethics and timing must improve.
Over the span of his 30-year career in Indian cinema, Jimmy Shergill has worked across a remarkable range of films which has given him a a hard-earned realisation how things work on a set, and just as importantly, how they shouldn't.
In an exclusive conversation with The Hollywood Reporter India for his upcoming Netflix show, Operation Safed Sagar, where he is set to star alongside an ensemble cast including Dia Mirza, Siddharth, Amrita Bagchi, Abhay Verma, Mihir Ahuja and more, the actor talks about the more unseen, undiscussed side of the Hindi film industry.
Shergill discusses the long hours that the industry subjects its workers to, with their health being overlooked, and called upon those in power to make a change.
Shergill claims that, "from the time we are called, which is one to one-and-a-half hours before time, till the time we pack up, for actors, it's 12 hours of shooting... which eventually becomes 15."
"That is still okay," he notes.
But, "my fight it for the workers," says the actor. He explains that the workers typically arrive on a set three hours before the shoot begins and also have to wrap up and leave, which takes — he counts to himself —"12 plus three plus three... 18 [hours], followed by their travel time back home."
"So he's just going home to meet his wife and come back. What kind of life is he living?" he questions, explaining that workers put up with such conditions because they have no other option.
"Somebody has to genuinely take care of that because health is the most important thing for the workers. A guy doing that every single day is not gonna last too long," says the actor.
Shergill believes that life is more than just about money, which people in power must understand. He also goes on to say that what really matters is the "work ethics of a place and the timings."
"Everywhere in the world, the timing is 12 hours. You should work however much you want within those hours, but after that workers need their own time," he feels. "We actors are privileged because we might be able to wrap up our work in those 15 to 20 days and go back home and sleep. The workers can't."