Manu Rishi Chadha, who plays Pakistan Army Chief Pervez Musharraf in Netflix's Operation Safed Sagar, has been garnering praise for his performance and for bringing the real-life character to life.
Sharing an inside view of his preparation process, the actor said he followed the Pakistan Army Chief on YouTube to grasp his mannerisms. But it was actor Nawazuddin Siddiqui who helped him with a lived experience.
“Musharraf was a real person, but what mattered first was what had been written about him and how he would behave. I started looking for ways to understand him. You can learn a lot from YouTube—his mannerisms, the way he spoke, and so on. For me, adopting the way he spoke would have been easy. And being comfortable is very important when you are playing a character,” Manu Rishi Chadha told PTI.
Manu Rishi Chadha said that YouTube gave him a lot of content, but he needed guidance on how to approach it.
“When I went on YouTube, I found a lot of things interesting. But then I happened to meet Nawazuddin Siddiqui. I was actually there to narrate a film to him, and I asked him how he had approached playing (writer Saadat Hasan) Manto. He told me, ‘I didn't have a visual reference. I had read about him, and I put my faith in Nandita (Das, director). I would use my acting process to see whether what she was telling me connected with my human mind and heart.' I followed that approach,” he added.
Inspired by the Indian Air Force's role during the 1999 Kargil War, Operation Safed Sagar follows the Golden Arrows Squadron as a group of young fighter pilots undertake high-altitude combat missions while navigating the emotional and personal costs of war. Chadha is part of the show's ensemble cast, which also includes Jimmy Shergill, Siddharth, Abhay Verma, Adil Hussain, Mihir Ahuja, Taaruk Raina, Arnav Bhasin, Amrita Bagchi, Dia Mirza, and Prajakta Koli.
