Amazon Prime’s Family Man was a huge success and all the actors of the series were highly appreciated for their performance. Manoj Bajpayee who essayed the lead in the series virtually sat down for an ‘In Conversation’ session for the ‘Creating Cult Icons: India’s own James Bond with the family man’ organised on the side-lines of the 52nd International Film Festival of India in Goa.
Talking about the roles he has played the actor said, “I never try to make the character larger than life. I always try to live in the reality and make the character a representative of the masses.”
Manoj addressed the session virtually and said that the life of the Indian middle class is a comedy and it is the inspiration and reference for all his characters. “I didn’t need to search Srikant Tiwari, my character in the ‘The Family Man’ series anywhere else. I got it within me, in my family, in my surroundings and everywhere”, he quoted.
Bajpayee said that ‘The Family Man’ is a great story of a middle-class Indian guy, trying to find a balance between a demanding job and a demanding family. “When Raj and DK came to me with the synopsis, I was sold out to it”, confessed Manoj.
Raj Nidimoru and Krishna D.K., known as Raj and DK also addressed the session saying they wanted to do a pan-India story.
“The biggest expression of freedom that we experience when we started The Family Man series was why should we limit ourselves? To break the barrier and make the story pan-India, we reached out to the actors, crew and writers from different regions,” stated the directing duo.
South Indian actress Samantha Ruth Prabhu quoted that her character, Raji in the web series was the most vulnerable and challenging role for her. The actress did a lot of handholding and training for this.
“Raji was so new, unique and exciting. It allowed me to explore a new dimension and the actor in me couldn’t refuse this challenge”, she quoted.
Talking about the challenges of OTT platforms and why it demands a strong story and empathy of character Samantha said, “It’s very difficult to engage the audience of a web series as we have to overcome many hurdles. The control is always at the hands of the audience.”
The ‘In-Conversation’ session was held at IFFI 52 and was moderated by actor Ankur Pathak. The session started with felicitation of the panel by Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Apurva Chandra in the presence of Festival Director Chaitanya Prasad.
Founded in 1952, the International Film Festival of India is one of the most significant film festivals in Asia providing a genuine platform for exchanging ideas between young minds and established figures in film industries from across the globe.
The 52nd edition of the IFFI that started on November 20 in Goa will run till November 28. Following the COVID-19 protocols, the film festival is being held in a hybrid format.
