INTERVIEW| Web series allows you a longer time to tell a story: Shruti Haasan

Express News Service

Actress and singer Shruti Haasan is no newbie on OTT platforms. In fact, she made her debut with Treadstone on Amazon Prime Video way back in 2019. In less than a year, we saw her again in Coffee, Anyone? – part of the Tamil anthology Putham Pudhu Kaalai (2020), directed by Suhasini Maniratnam, and a year later, we saw her in xLife – part of the Telugu anthology Pitta Kathalu (2021), on Netflix.

Both anthologies were well received and Shruti alluded to a third project in a few interviews last year. It therefore wasn’t a surprise when Bestseller, based on The Bestseller She Wrote by Ravi Subramanian, released a month ago and was received equally well.

It was the most viewed show on Amazon Prime Video for a while and is now one of the most binge-watched shows in the country. We caught up with Shruti for a quick chat about the show and to find out what’s next in her career.

Excerpts…

The response to Bestseller has been outstanding. Did you expect it when you first read the script?

One always hopes that the audience will like the work and that they will like the series, but when I did read the script for Bestseller, I felt that it was a page-turner. Since it was so good when I read it as a script, I was hoping that it would translate well on screen too, and I am so happy that it was well received and that it’s now a binge-watch favourite.

Will you now consider more OTT projects and if so, why?

I was always open to OTT projects. In fact, before Bestseller, I had already worked on content for OTT platforms in Tamil and Telugu. I’ve always been a fan of the platform, so, yes, if there’s something good that’s offered and I find it interesting, then sure.

Is the medium very different from what you were doing in films? Were there nuanced differences you found while shooting for a web series?

While we’re shooting, you don’t really find that much of a difference, but you do realise that the platform, especially when it is a web-series, allows you a longer time to tell a story. It gives you a longer time to elaborate on characters and their backstories, something that you don’t get too much of a chance to do in a film. And playing the lead in the series led me to putting in a lot more time than I would for a movie.

We noticed you perform at a live gig in Mumbai recently. Will we be seeing you perform elsewhere too?

I had performed at Santanu Hazarika’s Black exhibit and it was really amazing because it was totally impromptu, last minute, and it was so much fun. I am planning a few more gigs especially since COVID-19 restrictions have finally been lifted.

What are your other upcoming projects that we can look forward to?

There’s Salaar with Prabhas, a pan-Indian project that will be dubbed into many languages and there are two more projects in Telugu, that I can’t yet speak about.

(‘Bestseller’ is streaming on Amazon Prime Video)