Just before signing on the dotted line for Ramayana, touted as the Indian film industry’s most expensive film, Ranbir Kapoor had turned vegetarian and quit smoking and drinking. In an old interview, the actor spoke about making a series of lifestyle changes, including Yoga and meditation, ahead of his next big project.
In the video, Kapoor shared his excitement about working in Ramayana, but added he hadn’t finalised the project. He also spoke in detail about his changed outlook towards life and the motivation behind these dietary and lifestyle changes.
While attending workshops and preparation to get into the character’s skin is common in Bollywood these days, the Animal actor said he was aiming to be healthy for his daughter Raha and for himself.
‘Trying to clean up my life’
“Right now, the focus is just to spend time with my daughter. I have changed a lot of my lifestyle. I have quit smoking and drinking,” he said in a video posted on X by a Fan Club.
The actor added that he had become a vegetarian and ‘doing a lot of yoga and meditation’.
“I am really trying to clean up my life, entering my 40s and trying to be healthy for my kid, healthy for myself,” he said.
The most awaited film of 2026
Awaiting a November 2026 release, Ramayana features Ranbir Kapoor in the lead role of Lord Rama, and Sai Pallavi as goddess Sita. The trailer of the film gives a glimpse at its grandeur and scale of production. Produced by Namit Malhotra, the ambitious project is on a massive budget of $500 million or approximately Rs 4000 crore.
The magnum opus will see the Brahmastra star romance Sai Pallavi, a prominent face in Tamil, Telugu, and Malayalam cinema.
Fans are eagerly awaiting the Nitesh Tiwari-directorial, not only for its stellar starcast including big names like Amitabh Bachchan, Yash, Sunny Deol, but also the cutting edge visual effects.
The portrayal of mythological characters on screen
Actors playing mythological characters on screen often leave an indelible mark on people who look at them with reverence. Arun Govil, who played Lord Rama in Ramanand Sagar’s iconic TV show Ramayan was once abused by a fan when he saw him smoking a cigarette, revealed the actor in The Kapil Sharma Show in 2020. The fan had reportedly said that while they considered him as God, he was sitting there smoking cigarettes.’
What Ranbir said on fatherhood
Fatherhood has been a game-changer for Ranbir and he felt he was reborn after he became dad to daughter Raha.
“Now that I am a father and have a daughter, that’s a game-changer. That is making me question detachment and indifference because I feel like I was just born. I was reborn. I feel the 40 years of my life that I have lived was another life. I am feeling new emotions, new thoughts… I never feared death. I always thought that I would die at the age of 71 because I had this obsession with the number 8. I don’t know why I said that. But now I am like that’s too soon. That’s another 30 years. So, all that has changed because of Raha,” he was quoted as saying by The Indian Express to Nikhil Kamath.
Fatherhood also made him quit smoking. “I started smoking cigarettes which became a very nasty habit from the age of 17 till last year when I finally quit. When I became a father, I started feeling very unhealthy,” he said.