Genelia D'Souza Deshmukh is pregnant and we are both very excited about it: Riteish Deshmukh

Riteish Deshmukh, 36, is chilled out and patient like his father. He can easily adjust to his surroundings and to people around him. He is a practising architect who wants to do many things in life, including making a museum for films. While he has recently won a National award for his Marathi film Yellow, he will soon make his debut as a Marathi actor. Over an hour-long conversation, ahead of his upcoming Sajid Khan comedy Humshakals, he talks to Bombay Times about life after his father, his soulmate Genelia and why he loves his mother the most in the world. Excerpts:

How did you come into films? I was born in Latur, where my father was a local politician and lived there till the age of five, when my father became a minister and we moved to Mumbai. I changed two schools in Mumbai, before I was moved with my older brother to a hostel in Panchgani, as my father was not a minister and, thus, we did not have a house in Mumbai. My mother, at this time, moved back with my younger brother Dheeraj to Latur. In 1986, my father again became a minister and that's when we came back to Mumbai and our formal education started. After finishing school, I went to Kamla Raheja School of Architecture and completed my architecture degree. I was going to New York to work for a year, but met my father's friend Subhash Ghai before leaving. He was building Whistling Woods at that time. Subhashji was going to shoot Yaadein in London and invited me on his set to see the shoot on my way to New York. I said, 'Wow, I will get to see Hrithik Roshan.' I went on the set and spent a few days there and then moved to New York. I was 23 then. There was a friend of mine, who had left architecture with me, but was assisting Subhashji and was visiting New York when I was there. I was looking at taking up some creative courses there and he suggested I do theatre workshops, as that would help me understand people better. After a year-and-a-half, the DOP of Yaadein who had seen me in London asked my director friend if I was interested in acting. I was a big fan of Shah Rukh Khan and have grown up on Hindi films. I used to watch five films a day, do my homework on movies and sometimes even watch the same movie 10 times. As a family, we would often go out for movies. I had never thought of becoming an actor, but through that DOP I got my first film Tujhe Meri Kasam, made by Ramoji Rao, as he was also the DOP on that film. My father, by this time, was the Chief Minister of Maharashtra and I had to go and take his permission. While it took me 10 days to sum up the courage to ask him, contrary to what I thought, he said, 'Go, do it,' and I became an actor.