PTI

New Delhi, Aug 2: Veteran actor Naseeruddin Shah, who recently opened his innings as a director is worried about falling acting standards and says he does not have happy memories of all the directors he worked with in his acting career.

"Not all my directors were good. There were only some who could help me when I was facing acting troubles. A director's job is to relax the actors, put them at ease so that they can perform without inhibitions," says the thespian.

"I believe that there are no weak actors. There are only weak directors. There were a lot of films I did at one point in time, which I hated doing and hated watching." Though he refuses to name the "bad" directors as he does not want to "offend" anyone, Naseer names Shyam Benegal, Gulzaar and Sai Paranjpye as those who helped him overcome his "troubles" everytime he struggled with a shot.

Now that he has embarked on his directorial journey, he has something equally interesting to say about his fellow-actors.

"I do not know when the standard of acting will improve in our industry. Here, actors feel they can start performing anytime they want. Elkazi (Ebrahim Alkaazi-the celebrated former director of National School of Drama) would say that no musician, singer or true artist would perform in front of an audience without practise. But actors feel they do not need to practise." This explains why Naseer held rehearsals for all his actors before he started shooting his maiden film.