Film actor Rajniesh Duggall can relate to the saying ‘once bitten twice shy”. Reason? This good looking dude, who will soon be seen in a comic caper Udanchhoo, will henceforth stay away from TV weeklies. He had done the Star Plus historical Aarambh, which did not do well.
“We all were disappointed for everybody expected this Baahubali writer penned biggest budgeted TV show to click. I nearly gave one year of my life to this project for once you do TV, you don’t have time for anything else,” says Rajniesh to IndianWikiMedia.
So what went wrong, we ask? “I guess the weekend fiction band just does not work, sparing Naagin and Mahakaali only reality shows have worked on Saturday–Sunday evenings. Looking ahead I would be game for finite shows but yes, it will not be a saas bahu saga. I would like to try out thriller, sports or other genre in the Mon-Thu zone.”
Here, he also attributes the lower numbers of the above Aryan-Dravidian conflict saga to Star network OTT platform Hotstar streaming the episode before its TV broadcast.
“Many people including folks on my set would watch the online version. This must have surely affected the TRPs. Agreed, it is your earning machine, but it ended up hurting our show.”
Rajniesh feels that TV is huge and now with digital opening up in a big way, prospects are brighter. “Soon smaller films will directly release on Amazon Prime, Netflix and maybe AltBalaji down the road.”
This 36 year old dapper dude, who has appeared in hit films like 1920, and Ek Paheli Leela, is quite excited about Udanchhoo which also stars Ashutosh Rana and Prem Chopra.
“This heist film (producer and creative director Ravindra Singh) is a light-hearted take on black money and God men. I am playing five different characters. It was fun and I learnt from the above mentioned seniors.”
Interesting, Rajniesh’s film also has TV connection for Bigg Boss 8 winner Gautam Gulati was supposed to be doing Udanchhoo, but he backed out before shooting and Rajniesh replaced him. He had also collaborated with another TV actor Gurmeet Choudhary in Wajah Tum Ho, where he essayed a negative role.