- Harleen Sethi stars as Shreya, a complex character in Netflix's Shaque: Trust No One
- Shreya's role involves an affair with her best friend's husband, creating a morally grey character
- Sethi empathized deeply with Shreya, developing her backstory and relationships before filming
There's a certain ease with which Harleen Sethi sheds her garb of being a celebrity and completely melts into being a relatable individual. The actor, who skyrocketed to fame with Broken But Beautiful in 2018, has since surprised viewers with an impressive range of roles in her filmography. The latest is Netflix's Shaque: Trust No One, where, amid an ensemble cast spearheading the show, Harleen Sethi surely held her own and proved her mettle once again in a meaty character.
Harleen Sethi played the role of Shreya, Anvita's (Parineeti Chopra) onscreen best friend. For those who haven't watched the show, we won't give away too many spoilers, but will set the base for a rather grey character that Sethi takes up here.
To begin with, Shreya isn't very likeable. She has an affair with her best friend's husband - a classic case of 'one thing led to another' - and at every point, she gives you more reasons not to like her. Working her way through a tightly knit suspense thriller, Harleen Sethi managed to make viewers hate her and love her in intervals, but never ignore her.
In an exclusive conversation with NDTV, Harleen Sethi opens up about what her dynamic with her onscreen character Shreya really was.
The actress says, "It was really interesting because I kept oscillating between judgment and having to empathise with and understand this person, right? To be able to play her. So it was really hard to keep my own moral judgment low. And to make her human, I really had to start from scratch. I also had to write down her entire dynamic with Anvita because they were childhood friends. And then, how did I fall in love with Alok (Tahir Raj Bhasin)? And then, why didn't he choose me? And then, why did I marry Bhaskar (Sumeet Vyas)? So it was all this life that I had to create to be able to understand her actions in the present moment while I was playing it."
She continues, "I genuinely had to find my dynamics before we went on set - with Bhaskar, with Alok, with Anvita, with herself, with her parents, her childhood trauma, whatever it is that I could, to empathise with Shreya."
So is it a success or a failure if, by the end of the series, when the cat is out of the bag, the audience still hates Shreya?
Harleen Sethi says it's a success. She adds how the beauty of the show is that it does not play out in black and white.
On Bonding With Co-Stars, Especially Jennifer Winget
It's beautiful how the journey of filming a project brings together people and friends for a lifetime. That's how things rolled between Jennifer Winget, who played the ultimate catalyst to the show's many twists and turns, and Harleen Sethi, off camera.
The two have shared several BTS glimpses of shooting for Shaque, and Harleen Sethi even attended Jennifer Winget's dreamy wedding recently with her longtime beau, Will. Harleen Sethi opens up about how their friendship bloomed and is now one for the books.
Harleen Sethi opens up about how Jennifer Winget is fully present when she's with you, and then she disappears. Recalling their days of filming Shaque in Shimla, the actress shares, "So even when we bonded in Chail and Shimla, and we spent all of this time together before we were partying, she was like, 'Harleen, I love you and you're my friend and all of these things. So don't expect very frequent calls, and you know, I'm just not that person. So don't take it personally.' So, that disclaimer."
Getting emotional, Harleen Sethi adds how Jennifer Winget now gets to spend this beautiful life with her partner, Will. She adds that one of the many things a show like Shaque gave her was a friend like Jennifer Winget.
"It's not like we met only around the wedding. You know, me and Jenny obviously kept in touch. And even though she said she wouldn't be ready to step out of the house, we did meet for dinner. All of those things happened. So, of course, we were in touch, and I saw her on this journey of being with Will, then being proposed to, becoming a fiance and then the bride. So it was really sweet to see that journey."
As for being a hopeless romantic like her, Harleen Sethi says that Jennifer Winget might be a bigger one than her.
Harleen Sethi On Playing Characters Painted In Various Shades Of Love And Heartbreak
Over the years, Harleen Sethi has built a stellar reputation on OTT by playing deeply layered and humane characters. One thing remains constant, though: heartbreak.
In Broken But Beautiful, as Sameera Joshi, she dealt with obsessive grief and eventual self-healing. In Kohrra, as Nimrat Kaur, who was grappling with an unhappy marriage, she battled loveless obligation and the search for agency. In Shaque, her character Shreya is slowly suffocated in a conflicted affair, and the guilt and tragic consequences of betrayal eventually consume her.
Now that's what we call range. But where does Harleen Sethi find herself in these varied onscreen characters, especially when it comes to love and its expectations?
Harleen Sethi shares, "You know, one of my friends told me, 'Harleen, you get all of these characters. You want to do the right thing, but you end up doing the wrong thing.'"
"I think whatever Shreya was doing, even if you're in love, it's not fair. I think, by this age, I'm very clear about those boundaries and where to draw the line. But every character that we play, every shade of love and heartbreak, all of it is within us and all of it is relatable, whether to our own lives or whether someone out there has lived it."
And with that, we bid farewell, with the hope of seeing Harleen Sethi play yet another tangible character, where love shall reign supreme in all its shades.