Amazon Prime Video begins 2021 with a bang; Amazon today launched the trailer of its most awaited original series Tandav. The series is created and directed by Ali Abbas Zafar and Produced by Himanshu Kishan Mehra.
The 9 part series boasts of a stellar star cast, Saif Ali Khan plays the protagonist and ably supported by Dimple Kapadia, Tigmanshu Dhulia, and Sunil Grover. The series premieres on 15th January 2021.
The trailer of the show takes viewers behind the closed, chaotic corridors of power and politics. Set in the capital of the world’s largest democracy, the series is a gripping, fictional drama that showcases the lengths to which people go in the pursuit of power.
On the launch of the trailer, we spoke to Aparna Purohit – Head of India Originals at Amazon Prime Video, and Himanshu Kishan Mehra- Producer on the show.
The theme of the show and what made her choose a political drama?
Over the last four years, we at Amazon Prime Video have worked towards telling compelling stories that speak to audiences across the length and breadth of the country. I am proud to say that Tandav is a story that is truly rooted in our soil. This our first political drama. It is an interesting story about the pursuit of power and the lengths one will go to get it and in some cases keep it. It has the right doses of all the ingredients: Love, Hate, Deceive, Betrayal, Suspense, and Thrill. When Ali came to us with the story in 2017, we instantly knew that this is the story to be told. He was passionate about his idea. Moreover, it is amazing to see how Himanshu has managed to put together all the efforts in this composition along with managing to get a stellar cast on-board – Saif Ali Khan, Dimple Kapadia, Sunil Grover, Tigmanshu Dhulia, Dino Morea Kumud Mishra, Gauahar Khan, Amyra Dastur, Mohd. Zeeshan Ayyub, Kritika Kamra, Sarah Jane Dias, Sandhya Mridul, Annup Sonii, Hitten Ttejwani, Paresh Pahuja, and Shonali Nagrani all have outdone themselves to nail their performances in the show. It has been a wonderful journey and together we have seen Tandav take shape and become a series. We are incredibly proud to present this to our customers. We are looking forward to starting this New Year with a big bang.
We have always endeavored to tell stories that are culturally rooted, shows that can speak to many India’s that co-exists. Also, we try to ensure that we have a good bank of all the genres that exist. For example – war drama – The Forgotten Army, musical – Bandish Bandits, comedy like Four More Shots Please!, crime drama and thrillers like PaatalLok, The Family Man and Mirzapur. I think the only missing piece was a political drama and Tandav addresses that need gap. I distinctly remember when Ali (Ali Abbas Zafar, Creator or Tandav) narrated the story to us in 2017. He is a very visual narrator. We felt that the story was a peek into the world that we read about in newspapers and seen on the television but hardly know about it in detail. It was a very easy decision to make to opt for this one. And then finally the wonderful cast came together for this show and breathed life into the characters and created all the magic. I am incredibly proud of this show and this journey that we have had.
Why Political drama and a show on such a large scale?
Political Drama is an untapped genre and for a nation that is so obsessed with its politics, it wasn’t a difficult choice to make. Moreover, when you have such a passionate creator like Ali on board who has such an amazing cinematic voice, a writer like Gourva Solanki who has crafted all the characters with the utmost sensitivity and wrote dialogues with such detailing along with versatile and assembled casts who brought life to the characters, it has been an exhilarating journey collaborating with everyone. As far as the scale is concerned, we had Himanshu. We like to enable our creators to help them translate their creative vision in an un-diluted way on the screen and we facilitate whatever it takes to do that.
Himanshu Kishan Mehra
It all started from a text and then Ali narrated his idea to me. He convinced me to make this idea a long format show. Then once we had everything in place, we met Aparna Purohit, Head of India Original at Amazon Prime Video to present this idea. Once that was done we got Gourav Solanki on-board to write for us. It just kept getting bigger and bigger and what matters is how it starts and takes the shape eventually. Initially, on text, it was looking good, and then we just kept doing things that were best suited for the respective characters and sequences. I must say that all the professionals at Amazon Prime Video were absolutely bang. They wholeheartedly supported us on whenever we bring to the table. Mounting this scale and getting this stellar cast on-board, it all just happened because it was right there on the text. Eventually, all the things fell in place when the passionate cast delivered their best performances. Here the producer’s job becomes even easier.
