Tanuj Virwani is beaming with pride for being a hands-on dad. The actor, who was among the early Bollywood names to make the leap to OTT with Inside Edge (2017), has been juggling work and family life with ease. After wrapping up the shoot of the JioHotstar film Jumper in 2024, released in August, and Rana Naidu 2 (2025), Virwani moved away from the screen for longer than expected. In conversation with mid-day, the actor opens up about fatherhood, learning parkour, and his experience of working with Vijay Raaz in Jumper.
Excerpts from the interview.
You took a year-long gap after Rana Naidu. Was it to spend time with your newborn baby, or were you busy shooting?
Rana Naidu came out last June. This was more like a forced gap because it was not in my hands. I’m just an actor. I come, do my work, and move on. I think because there’s a lot of realignment — mergers and acquisitions — happening in the entertainment space, especially the OTTs [so it took time]. Anyway, I feel in the last two-and-a-half years, there was a bit of overexposure, necessarily not a bad thing. But I did feel a little overexposed because I was getting confused. Once the audience gets tired of watching you or feel that you’re delivering similar products, it’s difficult to get their attention back. So, it’s better to create a bit of an artificial shortage and then return. And I try to balance work and life. I spend enough time at home with my wife [Taniya Jacob], child [Navya], and family.
(L-R) Tanuj Virwani and Vijay Raaz in ‘Jumper’
How does it feel to be a father?
It feels fantastic. Every day has been a learning experience, and it has been exciting. Also, we’ve been travelling a lot. We recently took a Disney cruise over to Singapore. That was amazing.
Tell me about Jumper.
I play a cable operator and a covert operative for the police. Two very obscure and weird professions mixed together. He’s got his ears on the ground. I think that’s what made me gravitate towards the project. When I signed the film, it was called Johnny Jumper. They probably felt it’s cleaner to use a single word. I’ve not done something like that. It’s fast-paced. It’s got a nice comic undertone thriller vibe to it. After a lot of dramas and thrillers, I wanted to do some action. I seldom get the chance to do wire work and parkour. My body double leaped across buildings for me, but I did manage to do a lot of the stuff that you see on screen.
What is your biggest takeaway from the show?
That would be getting the chance to work with amazing actors like Vijay Raaz. He’s such a chiller. And so different when the cameras are rolling. I met him five minutes before we went for our first shot. It’s not often where the villain of the film puts the hero of the film at ease in his own movie. However, we don’t have many face-to-face scenes until the second half. I’ve grown up watching him. It’s great fun. All of them were great fun to shoot with. When you work with actors of a certain calibre, you are forced to raise your game.
[popcorn number="2023" desc="When Tanuj Virwani started shooting for ‘Jumper’" class="Default"]
Virwani’s OTT outings
‘Inside Edge’ 2017–2021
‘Poison’ 2019
‘Code M’ 2020–2022
‘Illegal – Justice’, ‘Out of Order’ 2020
‘Masaba Masaba’ 2020
‘The Tattoo Murders’ 2021
‘Murder Meri Jaan’ 2021
‘Murshid’ 2024
‘Rana Naidu 2’ 2025
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