With Rana Naidu, the Indian adaptation of the hit American series Ray Donovan, showrunner Karan Anshuman says he steered clear of the usual tropes of storytelling that have often dominated crime dramas. Anshuman, who co-directed the series with Suparn Verma, said it was a challenge to make the Rana Daggubati and Venkatesh Daggubati-starrer stand apart from shows in the genre that have come out in recent times. "The challenge for this crime drama was that we were not following any kind of pattern. When you are watching a film or series, you know what is going to happen next, (but) that is not the case here. "We were not sticking to what is a cookie-cutter template. You will be shocked by some of the decisions we take with the main characters and how they make very questionable moral choices," Anshuman told PTI in an interview. Rana Naidu, which debuted on Netflix last week, follows the life of its titular protagonist (Rana), the go-to guy for everyone in Bollywood when they have a problem and his tumultuous equation with father Naga Naidu (Venkatesh). Another key task for Karan Anshuman, who earlier worked on original stories with Amazon Prime Video's sports drama Inside Edge and hinterland gangster series Mirzapur, was to make the Indian adaptation better than the original show, led by Liev Schreiber. "Original writing is unrestricted and liberating. But you never know if you are going to strike gold in terms of whether it will all come together satisfactorily and entertain. "With adaptations, you know the concept has worked. So, the challenge is to up the game. And this is Hollywood level execution and acting you are up against, so that's a massive challenge and you want the audience to say, ‘Wow, that was better than the original',” he said. The writer-director said he was keen to present real-life nephew and uncle Rana and Venkatesh in new avatars to their fans. The baggage of their stardom never weighed on Anshuman's mind, he added. "I didn't have any baggage like fans. because when I met him (Venkatesh) for the first time and tried to talk him into it (show), he was trying to tell me that he wants to do it. He looked like a gangster on the Zoom call. He was sitting in the way he was supposed to look in the show," he said. Suparn Verma, best known for his work as a director on the second season of Prime Video series The Family Man, said working with Venkatesh was like helming a first-bencher student who tops the class but is still nervous. "The thing with both Rana and Venky sir is that they come without an ego. They have done an insane body of work but when they are on set, it is a new arena for them and that empowers us as directors to push them further. They submit completely and that's a joy,” he added. At the core of Rana Naidu, Karan Anshuman said, is a story about family dynamics, something that intrigued him the most when he was approached by producer Sunder Aaron to adapt the acclaimed American TV series for the Indian audience. "It is about family (ties) with Indian values and ethos, and the way we look at our families. That just made it so relatable,” he said. Rana Naidu also stars Ashish Vidyarthi, Abhishek Banerjee, Priya Banerjee, Gaurav Chopra and Sushant Singh.
