Playing the game and how

An actor, a rapper and above all, a storyteller. This was the brief that we had of Chaitnya Sharma aka SlowCheeta based on his recent stint in sports drama Maidaan co-starring Ajay Devgn and his latest rap track with Ranveer Singh titled ‘Kar De Kaa?’ from the EP Scene Main Bawaal. His wife, actress Shweta Tripathi Sharma, is the light of his life.

But what explains his stage name, SlowCheeta? He tells us that his mother calls him Cheetah and his brother Sheru. So, when he had to pick a name for his rap tracks, he zeroed down on Cheetah. But why slow? Well, for Chaitnya, slow and steady wins the race.

“I went with ‘slow’ because everyone has this stigma about rapping that it needs to be fast-paced. You see artistes like Notorious BIG and Snoop Dogg and you realise that they used to slow down their rap pace and my style is also very similar to theirs. Plus, growing up, I loved this band, Red Hot Chili Peppers who had a song named ‘Slow Cheetah’, which I loved.

” I recently wrote a song called ‘Chai Biskoot’ where I address this very question that I am very frequently asked. The song looks at how I can’t figure out who I am and I do not wish to also. We have all grown up learning to put everything in boxes because it is easy to process.

I feel like that is a limitation in art. Art is very fluid. We are all everything that we choose to be.

I enjoy expressing myself, so, whatever stage or medium I find, I am happy to be there. I have been acting professionall.