PremiumKaala | Avinash Tiwary: There is content saturation on OTT for sure, but good ones will make noise, stay, and reach more people | Exclusive
After Bambai Meri Jaan, Avinash Tiwary will next be seen in Kaala.
Last Updated: 04.21 PM, Sep 14, 2023
Just a few hours after the release of Bambai Meri Jaan, Avinash Tiwary is ready for Kaala to drop on September 15, 2023, on Disney+ Hotstar. It's rare for an actor to have two series released at the same time on different OTT platforms. In the upcoming series, Avinash plays the role of an IB officer whose ghosts of the past haunt him as he uncovers "reverse hawala." The actor has more emotional complexity thanks to the Bejoy Nambiar-created series.
On playing intense characters and emotional complexity
During an exclusive interaction with OTTplay, Avinash was asked what draws him to these intense characters and how he navigates the emotional complexities of the characters that he plays. The actor told us, "I don't really choose; directors like Bejoy come up with it, and you just jump on an opportunity like this. I mean, as far as emotional layers and doing that, I think that's the job of an actor. It's high time people started seeing that and acknowledging it."
Talking about Kaala, the actor stated, "For this specific show, in his journey, he happens to have made a few personal discoveries. What is interesting for me, as far as Rithwik is concerned, is what drives him. To me, he came across as a guy who was... we've seen IB officers, we've seen bureaucrats doing stuff on cinema. But there's a certain sensitivity that Bejoy brought to the writing itself, which I thought was very unique. I saw him, in a broader sense, as a hero character who seemed very unique in his own way. He seemed like a guy who's more about endurance—the last man standing. You can beat him; he's bruised, but he'll get up and get to the finish line no matter what. So this unstoppable quality that he had was something that aligned with my own personal life, and it kind of excited me to take on it.
Significance of supporting characters in web series
Kaala has two more actors with pivotal storylines, including Rohan Vinod Mehra and Jitin Gulati. Avinash responded that actors are supporting the directors' storytelling when asked about the growing significance of supporting characters in web series.
He shared, "I think actors, anyway, are just supporting the storytelling that the director is telling. We are all just a medium for the director to tell the stories that they're telling. If I may, this show is primarily the story of three guys and how their stories interlink with the thread of this financial scam that we are showing. So I think that is what makes it so interesting, and you will find that every character that is part of the show is almost like the hero of his own story; that is the beauty of the writing of Kaala and the way Bejoy has directed."
On content saturation and the future of OTT platforms
Kaala is a crime genre series based on a financial scam. In an era when there's an outburst of content, Avinash agreed with the fact that there's saturation. However, the actor also added that content will be streamlined down the line as subscriptions for these OTT platforms keep increasing.
He said, "I mean, there is saturation for sure. If I see content, there are many films and series releasing, and I don't know which one to watch. But over a period of time, you know that the good ones will make noise, stay there, and reach more people. What I've also been amazed by is how the OTT platforms are adding subscriber bases to their platforms. So there are newer audiences that they are gaining, and also, with the reach to other countries apart from India, most of the platforms have reached almost 200 countries, so you are in an aspiration to add more subscribers and more audiences."
"I think as we keep adding audiences, the content will start getting distributed, and you will be able to make a choice for your kind of content. So it's only going to get better from here on. Right now it's just kind of cramped up, but it's going to ease out, from what I see. In a couple of years, we'll have a better distributed system, and we'll be able to make choices about what we want to do or see in a much better way," Avinash concluded.