Tusshar Kapoor has a word for what it's like being Jeetendra's son in this industry: Agneepath. Not the film, the fire test.

In a new conversation with The Free Press Journal, the actor laid out what he calls the one real advantage of a film-family surname and the pile of disadvantages that come with it. You get in the door faster, he says. Everything after that, you're on your own.

"When you are from a film family, an accomplished star's son... Then there is an expectation, especially within the film industry or within the trade, where no matter how much you do, the glass is always considered half empty rather than half full," Tusshar said. "So you have to always surpass yourself."

He didn't dress it up. Early on, he said, there was "a huge battalion of pull-downers who were waiting for you to fall." That's blunt for an actor who's mostly stayed out of industry-politics conversations over the years.

What changed things, by his own account, was distance. Tusshar credits stretches of living abroad and away from his family with giving him an identity separate from the Jeetendra surname, and the discipline to keep showing up for training and work without getting pulled into what was being said about him.

"I used to just block it out and just show up for work, show up for my classes," he said. "I would show up for work and just try to do my thing in my own way, in my track, and not focus on whatever is being said or what is being written. And then the film spoke for itself."

His bigger point, though, is about where the family advantage actually stops. Getting a debut, he argues, is the easy part for someone with industry connections. Making the film work is a different game entirely, and one that isn't in anyone's control, star kid or not.

"Us film ko complete karna, us film ko logon ke saamne tak lana, aur film ka chalna, woh aapke haath mein nahin hai," he said. "So that's the only advantage we have with all these disadvantages, that you get a break. You are more accessible to people who want to launch star sons."

Tusshar debuted with Jeena Sirf Merre Liye in 2002 and has spent over two decades moving between comedy and drama in Hindi cinema since. His comments land in the middle of a wider, louder conversation this week about nepotism and industry favouritism, with actors on both sides of that argument getting quoted a lot lately. Tusshar's version is quieter than most: less accusation, more accounting of what a surname buys you and what it never will.