“The complete sequence that I shot with Akshay (Kumar) sir in the film is memorable.” - Amika Shail

She’s a livewire… full of beans, chirpy and articulate. Meet singer-turned-actor Amika Shail who over the last couple of years has been steadily making a niche for herself in Bollywood. She’s been an integral part of Akshay Kumar’s Laxmmi, Mirzapur 2, Gandii Baat 6 and Disney+Hotstar’s Chhatis Aur Maina. Besides this, Amika has done around five webseries after acting on television for a span of three years wherein she has been a part of shows like Balveer Returns, Divya Drishti and Udaan. In this exclusive interview, the irrepressible Amika talks to Stardust about being an outsider in the industry and how she managed to carve a niche for herself in the film industry. Read on…

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What was your journey in the entertainment world like?

I would say that I had an amazing journey so far. I started singing at the age of 5. Since I am from Bengal and my mother is a singer, as a child, I was always inspired by her. When I turned 5, I started my training in classical singing. My mother was my first teacher. This is how my journey as a singer began.

I got into professional singing after I shifted to Mumbai post Graduation. But prior to that, I was a part of a lot of reality shows. So Bombay was like a second home to me which I visited frequently to participate in singing reality shows like Sa re ga ma, Little Champs, Amul Star Voice of India, Bharat ki Shaan etc. Once I shifted to Mumbai post my graduation, I took to singing as my career.

It has been more than 7-8 years that I am into singing. I have sung for movies, I have sung for music albums, I have released my own music albums as well. I have my YouTube channel which has like 80k+ subscribers.

So how did acting happen?

I was fully into singing and then acting happened accidentally. Now it has been two years that I am into acting. The acting journey began with a musical show. They needed a singer-actor for that show and they approached me. I went for an audition but did not get selected then. It was also because I was not ready as an actor at that time. But yes, this was my first baby step into the world of acting and then I groomed myself for it.