Plot
Ganpat Ramchandra Belwalkar aka Appa, an acclaimed veteran theatre actor, has earned immense fortune, fame, and the prestigious title of Natsamrat (transl. The Emperor of Actors). Following his retirement, he bequeaths his entire wealth and property to his children, keeping nothing for himself. Appa's outspoken nature and frequent use of expletives to express himself alienate his son, Makrand, and daughter-in-law, Neha. After Makrand's daughter performs a folk dance taught by Appa at a school function, Neha expresses her embarrassment and resentment towards Appa, demanding household separation. Recognizing her intent, Appa voluntarily moves out with his wife, Kaveri.
The couple relocates to the home of their daughter, Vidya, and her supportive engineer husband, Rahul. While Rahul tolerates Appa's erratic behaviour and appreciates his recitals, his alcoholism and unfiltered nature irk Vidya. Meanwhile, Appa visits his close friend Rambhau, who is hospitalised and devastated following the death of his wife, Kumud. Rambhau lashes out at Appa for abandoning him in his final days. While lying on his hospital bed, Rambhau enacts a heart-touching conversation between Karna and Krishna, with Appa performing alongside him, and urges Appa to end his pain. Upon returning home, Kaveri informs Appa about Rambhau's death, and he quietly admits to supplying the sleeping pills to assist in his friend's mercy killing.
After Appa insults the son of Rahul's boss over a weak theatrical adaption of Othello, an embarrassed Vidya moves her parents to an outhouse on the property. Later, she misplaces a sum of money and falsely accuses her parents of theft. Though she finds the misplaced cash and apologizes, a deeply hurt Appa and Kaveri leave during the night for their ancestral village. En route, they take shelter in a small village, where Kaveri succumbs to a severe fever.
Devastated by Kaveri's demise, Appa drifts into poverty and mental decline. He befriends Raja, a homeless shoe shiner living under a bridge. To survive, Appa takes a job serving tea at a local tea stall, where he occasionally entertains the customers with dramatic monologues. A young theatre enthusiast named Siddharth recognizes Appa and relentlessly follows him, though Appa denies his identity.
Upon reading that his favourite theatre has been destroyed in a fire, Appa rushes to the site, shattered to find it reduced to ashes. Siddharth, along with Appa's estranged family and Raja, arrives at the ruins to find him. Appa finally acknowledges his true identity to Siddharth and refuses his family's pleas to return home. Delusional, he steps on the burnt stage, delivers a passionate monologue about the burden of existence and the essence of acting before suddenly collapsing and dying on the stage.
Release
The film was released on 1 January 2016, which is also the birthday of Nana Patekar. Apart from Maharashtra, Natsamrat released in Gujarat, Goa, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Delhi, Telangana and West Bengal with nearly 1,600 shows across more than 400 screens in the country daily. It also had special screenings in countries like UK, Singapore, Canada, USA till March 2016. Even in its 6th week it was running successfully in 174 theaters with 2,225 daily shows all over Maharashtra.
