Sacred Games: Joshi delivers strong performance

"Sacred Games" screenwriter Varun Grover says Jitendra Joshi is among those actors who "surprised" him the most with his stellar performance in the Netflix's first India Original series.

The 38-year-old writer and series' co-director, Vikramaditya Motwane engaged in an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit India in which the duo were asked a number of questions about the popular show.

One of the Redditors asked Grover to name a particular actor who surprised him the most with the performance in terms of taking his writing to another level.

He named Joshi, who played Mumbai Police Constable Katekar, a loyal sidekick to Saif Ali Khan's Inspector Sartaj Singh and Neha Shitole, who played Katekar's loving wife, nagging him for placing duty above his family.

"So many of them actually, if not ALL of them took the script to the next level. The kind of response the show is getting is only because EVERY department has done way better job than they were expected to do at their best.

"In terms of improvisations, Jitendra Joshi added the most to the lines and Neha Shitole (Shalini Katekar) completely improvised those heartbreaking lines to Sartaj after Katekar's death," Grover replied.

When Motwane was asked to choose a character he wished did not die in the first season, he answered, "Katekar obviously. But that's the whole point of killing him off. You miss him a lot."

On the other hand, Grover said he would have saved RAW agent Anjali Mathur, played by Radhika Apte, had it not been for the story arc.

A Redditor when asked "Could there be a separate Netflix special of Katekar", the director said, "I would sign up for that."

"Sacred Games" has been co-directed by Motwane who shot with Khan, while Anurag Kashyap helmed Nawazuddin Siddiqui's portions.

The series, based on the bestselling novel of the same name by Vikram Chandra, premiered on Netflix from July 6.