Kusha Kapila on Failing, Producing 'Vyarth', and Rewriting the Script: 'Maybe Trying Is Enough'

Kusha Kapila has never been shy about trying. Not when she was uploading observational comedy sketches from her bedroom, not when she was making her acting debut in Thank You For Coming (2023), and certainly not now, as she debuts as a producer with the short film Vyarth.

The film, which recently premiered on YouTube, tells the story of Bhumi, an actress in her late twenties, who finds herself pigeonholed into one role: the mother. Tired of being typecast, she fights back with dignity, discomfort, and rage. It’s a far cry from the high-energy skits Kapila built her name on. And that, perhaps, is the point.

Kusha Kapila in 'Vyarth'

“I've just wanted to perform—period,” Kapila says. “And when I say perform, I don’t mean only comedy. Of course, people associate me with humour. That’s fair. But that doesn’t mean I haven’t auditioned for drama, for weightier parts that require something else, something deeper. It’s not that I want to erase my past. It’s that I don’t want it to become my ceiling.”

This hunger to expand, to explore, to experiment, and to fail is central to where Kapila finds herself today. Vyarth isn’t just a story about typecasting; it’s also a meta manifesto. A refusal. A reclamation. And, in many ways, a mirror of Kapila’s own recent journey: from social media star to serious actor, from performer to producer, from viral sketches to long-form storytelling.

Failure doesn’t scare her anymore. “You're constantly exploring, creating and putting out an idea into the universe,” she says. “Some people are going to latch onto it. Some people won’t. You have to accept that. That's a part of creating. Anybody who creates, whether it's a director, actor, musician, or artist—knows that not everything is going to land.”

Kusha Kapila in 'Vyarth'

She’s experienced both: the exhilarating stickiness of her content creator era, and the humbling thud of fiction work that hasn’t yet clicked. “With content, I was very lucky. I threw something at the wall and it stuck. I’ve had more hits than misses,” she says. “But with fiction, I’ve had more misses than hits. Still, I just have to be there for it. I have to believe I’m in it for the long haul and then keep trying.” Kapila talks about failure not as a detour but as part of the path. “Some days the sun’s gonna shine out of your ass,” she says with a laugh. “Some days, not so much. And that’s okay.”

But what she finds even harder to sit with is neutrality. The feeling of a project making no impact at all. “A neutral response hurts more. It means the work didn’t make people feel anything,” she says. “That’s worse than hate.”

For Kapila, acting came with its own version of emotional math: the relentless measuring of personal worth against roles not bagged. “I used to take every rejection personally. With acting, that’s dangerous,” she admits. “In the last two years—ever since I moved to Mumbai, I had to unlearn that. I had to stop attaching my self-worth to every part I didn’t get.”

That shift, she says, came with a surprising realisation: that she had access. Access to writers, producers and collaborators. “I thought, why am I waiting? Why shouldn’t I take a chance on myself?” That leap of faith became Vyarth. A film that wasn't made to appeal to the masses but out of personal necessity. “There are two kinds of art,” she says. “One you make for the world. One you make for yourself. This is the latter.”

And the shorter format helped. “Make something for 20 minutes, then maybe you’ll feel ready to make something for 90 minutes. Then, someday, you might make a show with six 30-minute episodes. That’s a series. That’s the direction I’m thinking in now.”

Kusha Kapila

Kapila’s pivot away from comedy isn't an abandonment of her craft, but a recalibration. “If you just look at my life, I’ve always performed. But not only in comic roles,” she explains. “In school plays, I did all kinds of parts. So I don’t want to be boxed in now just because the Internet saw me a certain way.” Still, she knows the industry can be quick to slot people in. That’s why Vyarth—both in its subject and in its making—is so personal. It’s a refusal to stay boxed. A statement about multiplicity and about wanting to do more. “I would love to not be stereotyped,” she says. “That’s the goal.”

If Vyarth was a toe-dip, Kapila’s already diving deeper. She’s also just finished writing the series bible for a show she co-created called Dost By Chance, with longtime collaborators Srishti Dixit and Ayesha Nair (best known for her work on Pushpavalli). The goal is to get it green-lit. Soon after, she plans to experiment with micro-dramas, a form rapidly gaining currency in the Indian streaming landscape.

What keeps her going? The belief that even trying is worth something. “Maybe the fact that you tried is enough,” she says. “And that’s okay.” Because for Kapila, the work is no longer about chasing virality, she is in pursuit of a creative life that doesn’t need either an industry or an algorithm to validate it.