Actor Vijay Varma on Thursday said he grew fond of acting by seeing the passion for the craft in Bollywood veterans Pankaj Kapur and Naseeruddin Shah, with whom he gets to share screen space in the upcoming Netflix series IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack.

In a video shared by Netflix on Instagram, Vijay called Naseeruddin and Pankaj ‘legends’, reflecting on how their work has inspired him over the years.

Mentioning that he is a fan of all the stars in the upcoming Netflix series, Vijay said “I’ve literally learnt everything about the craft and I grew fond of acting just by looking at his (Naseeruddin) love for acting.”

“I have seen them working together in Maqbool and Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron. Pankaj sir, you have ‘the following’ in NSD and FTII. And a boy in Hyderabad who was dreaming of doing something substantial, they were such big faces, such big names to follow. So, I’m at peace working with them.”

“Compliments from the Captain - to Pankaj Kapur and Naseeruddin Shah. Watch the full IC 814 Actors’ Roundtable on the Netflix India YouTube channel,” Netflix wrote alongside the video.

Marking filmmaker Anubhav Sinha’s OTT debut, IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack focuses on the events following the hijack of an Indian Airlines flight shortly after it took off from Kathmandu in 1999.

IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack also stars Manoj Pahwa, Kumud Mishra, Arvind Swamy, Amrita Puri, Dibyendu Bhattacharya, Patralekha, Anupam Tripathi, Kanwaljit Singh, Aditya Srivastava, Sushant Singh and Yashpal Sharma.

The New Delhi-bound flight IC-814 was hijacked on December 24, 1999, when five terrorists took control of the plane 40 minutes after its departure from Kathmandu. The 180 passengers were held hostage for seven days. It flew from Kathmandu to Amritsar, then to Lahore for refuelling, and subsequently to Dubai. From Dubai, it flew to Taliban-controlled Kandahar, where the hostages were finally released on December 31, 1999.

IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack is slated to premiere on Netflix on August 29.