Family Man team spills season 3 secrets: ‘Nimrat Kaur’s character first written as a man, Jaideep Ahlawat’s role didn’t exist’

Enter: Not one, but two antagonists in Nimrat Kaur’s scheming boss lady Mira and Jaideep Ahlawat’s dreaded drug lord Rukma. Nimrat even got her blessings from Samantha on Instagram when the latter sent a shoutout to her after the trailer of season 3 came out earlier this month. “You just have to make sure you’re doing your best job, and have fun while you’re doing it. You can very quickly not do justice to what’s been given to you,” says Nimrat.

Raj then reveals, much to her pleasant surprise, that Mira’s character was initially written as male. “No wonder she thinks like a guy,” says Nimrat, laughing. “She was just an advisor to the chief antagonist. But then we thought we should pull her out and put her in the middle of all the action,” says Raj. “This is so fascinating! Because I felt while playing Mira that she’s thinking like a guy! This is not a woman’s way of handling things. She happens to look like a woman, but her instincts are quite masculine,” says Nimrat.

Nimrat Kaur as Mira in The Family Man season 3.

Nimrat Kaur goes dark

She was taken aback by the ruthlessness and the brutal approach with which Mira operates, and with no guilt attached at all. “I had to always pull back on my instincts as a woman ki ye toh kitni galat baat chal rahi hai! Ye achhi cheez toh nahi hai! (that this is something very wrong. This can’t be right),” says Nimrat, laughing. “So, you need to have that conversation internally, and step out of your own comfort zone as a person. That was the biggest challenge for me, and just such a delicious one,” she adds.

Even Jaideep’s Rukma wasn’t a part of the initial draft of Raj and DK and screenwriter Suman Kumar’s draft. “Rukma was more of a group of rebels who were fighting a cause. We needed somebody whom Srikant Tiwari would be intimidated by. Suddenly, we had the idea of splitting it into two,” says Raj. “Also, as we were doing the research about the area and its problems, we realized that the drug trade is also a problem. A drug dealer is as dangerous as a soldier because he has access to the same weapons, has an army, and operates outsides the law. The only difference would be that an enemy soldier is still fighting for a country. A drug dealer is only doing it for the money and power. He can be completely ruthless. That formed the genesis of the character,” adds DK.

Jaideep Ahlawat as Rukma in The Family Man season 3.

Jaideep Ahlawat returns to Nagaland after Pataal Lok

Jaideep returns to Nagaland months after his scene-stealing turn as Hathi Ram Chaudhary in Pataal Lok season 2. “Nagaland government should just give me a house there now,” he says, laughing. This time however, he’s not a cop, but the ruthless nemesis to Srikant Tiwari. “It’s a different man, different space, different people around, and a different vision. It’s a very difficult world to be in where Rukma is. He survives and flourishes in that area without being challenged by anyone. His power-driven and money-driven mindset is very interesting,” says Jaideep. DK insists that both Mira and Rukma aren’t just antagonists, but also the protagonists of their own stories. “When they clash, they just become the antagonists in this story,” he says.

With The Family Man season 3, Jaideep also reunites with Manoj. They’ve shared screen space in Bedabrata Pain’s 2012 period war drama Chittagong, and most famously, in Anurag Kashyap’s 2012 crime epic Gangs of Wasseypur, in which Jaideep played Manoj’s father. But Manoj believes that when it comes to acting, Jaideep is the baap between the two of them. “I keep calling him every time I watch Pataal Lok or his other work. He hasn’t called me yet though,” reveals Manoj, adding, “I learn a lot from his scenes, especially in Pataal Lok. How Hathi Ram reacts to something in a moment, I’ve even told him I’ve wondered that I perhaps something more within me to invoke. I thought it can’t be done better than how he does it. So, there’s always an admiration for actors who teach you new ways to do something.”

Manoj Bajpayee as Srikant Tiwari in The Family Man season 3.

Jaideep returns the favour by calling Manoj a “chalta-phirta institute.” “Even the little memories I have with him from Chittagong are monumental for me. I’ve even told him then that his speeches from Shool (1999) are still referenced in actors’ speech training. Generations have learnt from his craft. It’s a huge journey for me to observe him on the sets of Chittagong to now working with him now,” says Jaideep, visibly tearing up. But Manoj responds that the camera doesn’t oblige an experienced actor over a less experienced one. “Jab camera chalta hai na, saara ka saara seniority and experience dhara ka dhara reh jata hai. Only what you do at that point of time matters,” he says.

Manoj is not only senior to Jaideep, but also was one of the first movers in the realm of Indian streaming. He recalls when he was first approached by Raj & DK for The Family Man back in 2016, he was hooked to the one-line pitch: “James Bond, but from Chembur.” “OTT was very new then. I used to keep visiting the US, so a lot of people told me about the great actors who were now doing web shows like Narcos. Then Sacred Games came in India. But what I was very wary about was the template these platforms used before The Family Man. It was all murder, gore, and sex. That was something I didn’t want to be a part of. I was through with all of those roles in my career. I wanted to do something different,” confesses Manoj.

Manoj Bajpayee and Priyamani in The Family Man season 4.

How Family Man got his name

Manoj had been a part of some seminal gritty films throughout his career before that, from Shekhar Kapur’s Bandit Queen (1994) to Ram Gopal Varma’s Satya (1998). But since an OTT show would be consumed by the entire household, he wanted family to be at the focus of the show he attaches himself to. What better than The Family Man? “The whole idea of a day-today, regular guy who’s working for intelligence itself worked like magic for me,” says Manoj. DK is glad that the show is titled that because even as the show gets bigger with each season, “somebody will point out the show is called The Family Man.”

Raj even reveals that while they were always sure they wanted family to be at the core of The Family Man, they did get initial suggestions by platforms to change the title to something more singular and masculine. “We knew the title from the very beginning when we had just a logline in our heads. But later, everybody was bouncing ideas about what the name should be. They had ‘Agent Tiwari’ and all kinds of things (laughs). The idea was the fact that it’s an action series wasn’t coming through. ‘The Family Man’ sounded like it’s someone sitting at home. But we really stuck to it. Amazon was very sure of it even though there were many other titles thrown at it. So yeah, the juxtaposition, the fact that there’s so much family in it makes it so unique,” says Raj.

What happened in Lonavala?

While season 1 established the foundation of Srikant Tiwari’s family dynamics, season 2 used family as a micro symbol to represent the changes the country was going through at a macro level. In season 4, family faces the ripples of every failed Srikant Tiwari mission, as not only his blood relatives, but also citizens. For instance, a China-backed insurgent attack in Nagaland leads to a diplomatic ban on several Chinese apps, impacting his wife Suchitra’s business and his son Atharv’s leisure on a Tik-Tok-like platform. “Now, they’ve taken it some notches higher,” says Priyamani, who plays Suchitra, the family man’s wife on the show.

The fact that the audience is as invested in the familial aspects as they’re in the covert operations is demonstrated by the question that’s chased the Family Man team for two years — “What happened in Lonavala?” In season 1, when Suchitra goes on a company offsite with suspected love interest Aravind (Sharad Kelkar), the open-ended thread left the audience wondering if they kicked off an affair. “It was such a non-issue for us as creators. Why do you care? Go with the story! The interest in that one line is unbelievable,” says Raj, laughing. DK also points out how no one’s asking “what happened in Delhi?,” but can’t move on from Lonavala.

Also Read — Manoj Bajpayee says Amitabh Bachchan almost killed him: He gave me a heart attack at 85 feet, said, ‘Tell Jaya if something happens to me’

Why Suchitra betray Shrikant?

The question has followed Priyamani like a ghost of the past, even on Instagram. “If I post anything personal, whether it’s a solo picture or with family, the questions in the comments are all: ‘Why did you betray Srikant? You shouldn’t have.’ Even if I post a picture with my husband, there are comments that say: ‘Who’s this? You’ve betrayed Srikant!’ They’re so invested in the show that they can’t see anything else. But it’s really nice of them to do that,” she says, smiling. She believes it’s gone even beyond the pop-culture phenomenon that was “Why did Katappa kill Baahubali?” from SS Rajamouli’s Baahubali franchise. “Because the answer is not coming na,” says DK. The Family Man season 3 is now streaming on Prime Video India.

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