Swwapnil Joshi: Actors don’t make images, audiences do

Leaving behind the candyfloss romantic stories of Marathi cinema Swwapnil Joshi chose the dark and compelling Samantar for his web debut The actor is back with the second season which he describes as a ldquopacier thrillerrdquo In a chat with midday he opens up about the pressures of doing a sequel and how it has opened more doors for himEdited excerpts from the interviewIt has been a long wait for the second seasonThe first season premiered in March 2020 The second instalment was slated to premiere much earlier but we had to push the shoot due to the pandemic I had to put on weight for the second part We had taken a logistical break which got extended because of the ongoing situation We finally shot between October and December 2020Was it challenging to revisit the characterI have revisited characters in the past including in MumbaiPuneMumbai 2010 In the film I played the boynextdoor which was a character that the audience could relate to But here it was difficult to imbibe the characteristics of Kumar Mahajan his character in Samantar againSai TamhankarJoshi in SamantarDid you feel the pressure of matching up to the first instalmentI would be lying if I said there was no pressure But after a point the pressure takes a backseat and you concentrate on the work at handAlso Read Samantar 2 new promo released Is Sai Tamhankar playing a double roleHow has your first brush with digital entertainment beenWhen you do television or films there are many external factors that influence how you depict your story But on the web you have the liberty to tell stories as they are meant to be told the narratives have realism to them That attracts me to the web as an actorYoursquove been in front of the camera since you were a child artiste What do you think was the turning point in your careerThere have been quite a few I did a spate of shows like Uttar Ramayan Krishna and Amanat Then there was a phase when I ventured into comedy with Comedy Circus Post that I did Marathi films anchored musical reality shows and now have graduated to the web I believe my career has undergone a transition every four to five yearsDo you feel you got bracketed as the romantic hero Did Samantar help you shed the imageActors donrsquot make images audiences do Those who like my romantic performances prefer seeing me in similar roles Now a lot of people tell me that I should do more projects like Samantar It changed peoplersquos perception of me and I am being approached for genres that makers earlier didnrsquot consider me for The show has opened a lot of doors for meSamantar has been dubbed in other regional languages thus transcending language barriersBy dubbing I think the linguistic charm goes away That said I also feel gratified MXPlayer never treated Samantar as a Marathi series instead promoting it as a big show When I saw people lapping up Samantar in Telugu or Tamil it felt good to know that finally my writers technicians directors and authors in Marathi are getting a wider audience A lot of nonMaharashtrians would now be able to consume the material and I am proud that I was one of the mediums to enable thatAlso Read Swwapnil Joshi My children refuse to believe its me on screen