Samarth Shandilya: I Really Wanted to See Myself in a Negative Shade!

Actor Samarth Shandilya who has enthralled the audience with his performance in films like Jai Mummy Di, Saankal and Perfect Pati amongst others has bagged yet another interesting project. The actor will be seen in ALT Balaji- ZEE5's upcoming series titled Who’s your Daddy. The series was earlier titled as Bhai Humara Sakht Launda.  

In an exclusive conversation, Samarth Shandilya who will play a prominent role of the main negative lead in the series spoke to us about his character, what made him take up the project, working with Harsh Beniwal and Rahul Dev and much more. 

Read the entire interview below:

Can you tell us more about your character in the show?

I am the main negative lead. He's very dark in a comic way and full of vengeance.

What prompted you to take up this character?

 I have always been the funny guy. I am the one who is always doing the comic part and I just finished shooting for XXX Season 2, so even when everyone was doing the XXX part of it, I was being the funny guy. The people who know me, know that I am damn opposite of what I do. I have been told that my comic timing is really good and I feel really blessed that I have that in me but yes, I always wanted to be a bad guy.

 I have done some episodics before like Pyaar Tune Kya Kiya and all these shows in Bindaas. I have played a bad guy in it but this one was out and out bad. In a cute, in a very funny, in a very dramedy (drama and comedy) kind of way. 

I am the one who is literally bringing a dark side in a dramedy kind of situation, where everything is so cute, everything is so nice, everyone is happy and then suddenly I am there. The script and the director’s vision for my character is amazing and how we shot across Chandigarh, Ludhiana and parts of Punjab is brilliant.

How was it working with Harsh and Rahul Sir?

I have very limited scenes, actually I don’t have any scenes with Rahul Sir. I met Rahul Sir during the narration and in one of the script meetings and workshop, Rahul Sir actually said that Samarth, are you from any drama school? I said no, then he said that you are reading the script on the table and because of that even we are feeling that maybe we should read it like that with entire focus. Harsh was as usual brilliant.

Any particular moment or anecdote from the shoot?

After pack-up we used to go to someone’s vanity. Harsh and I used to stay in the same hotel, so after pack-up every single day, we used to go in someone else’s room, party, sleep for few hours.

  Lastly, you have recently done a movie, Jai Mummy Di and now you are doing this series, so how difficult or how similar it is to work on both the platforms?

The thing is I have been in Mumbai since 2012, and have done around five films and fourteen television shows. Now, it doesn't matter as the amount of effort that goes in is the same. On the film set, there are some two hundred people working in different departments and in web series it is smaller. But I think, people tend to watch web-shows a lot these days.