Nagesh Kukunoor quips on why Jaideep Ahlawat couldn't be cast in The Hunt: 'My hands were tied to a certain point' | Exclusive

Nagesh Kukunoor has always been comfortable tackling real-world storytelling, but in The Hunt: The Rajiv Gandhi Assassination Case, he opens up a highly sensitive political chapter in India. The filmmaker discusses the rapid development of the Applause Entertainment-backed series, the casting of performers that closely resembled real people, and the framing of the mystery of Sivarasan for the film in an exclusive interview with OTTplay. 

Adapting from Anirudhya Mitra’s Book 90 Days

The plot of the show is drawn from Anirudhya Mitra's 2022 book 90 Days, which explores the inquiry spearheaded by the CBI following the murder of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi. According to Kukunoor, the wheels were already turning long before the book was published.

"So Anirudhya Mitra had already approached Sameer Nair at Applause, and he had pitched this whole thing, and he had so much research and this and that. So Sameer had actually suggested that he write a book so then we could get everything down in one place and use that as the source material,” Kukunoor said.

ALSO READ: The Hunt review: Nagesh Kukunoor crafts a slow-burn manhunt with haunting precision 

The approach was made to him while the work was still in progress. The filmmaker went on to share, "Sameer had several meetings with Anirudhya, knew of the source material, and convinced me. And the beauty of the book is it just deals with the 90 days. It's just a police procedural. It's a thriller, and it has no political baggage. You're not picking sides. You're literally telling the events as they play out. So that's what attracted me to the whole material."

The story's spare, procedural structure facilitated its rapid transition from script to screen. Kukunoor revealed, "The moment, literally the moment, the book came out, it was handed to me, and off we went. We adapted it and shot it the following year in 2023."

Building the enigma of Sivarasan

The most challenging part was portraying Sivarasan, the LTTE agent who managed to escape capture for almost three months. Kukunoor saw it as an opportunity to form a persona that avoided overtly factual statements. He said, "See everything that was there about Sivarasan; I mean, the man eluded the largest manhunt, a nationwide manhunt, for 90 days. That was no easy feat."

He brought his past behaviour to his onscreen persona. The filmmaker stated, "He was just driven by his purpose and a lot of his previous things were also done like that, like when he assassinated one of the leaders on Indian soil, Tamilian leaders; it was very audacious. Every once in a while, people like that come along."

Kukunoor compared Karthikeyan's calm precision as the lead investigator with Sivarasan's erratic behaviour. He added, "You know how, when you have someone like a Karthikeyan, completely a man under control, and never, ever losing his cool, leading this SIT and a complete adversary on the other side. So it was amazing to just juggle these two people."

However, what he remembered most clearly was, "Everything that one heard and stuff that was written about Sivarasan was the fact that he was just this normal-looking guy who blended into any place that he was in. He's in plain sight virtually all the time."

Visual resemblance was crucial

Looks were paramount, according to Kukunoor, when casting important real-life personalities like Karthikeyan and Amit Verma. He said, "So a couple of things. One is that our actors needed to look like the characters. So that was very—my hands were tied to a certain point. You know, Jaideep Ahlawat, who I love very much, could not play Karthikeyan. It's as simple as that."

Choosing Amit Sial to play Karthikeyan was the right call. Kukunoor shared, "Amit Sial comes up; he looks very close to Karthikeyan. And of course, the people who know Karthikeyan, and I'm sure Mr. Karthikeyan himself will say, ‘Oh, he doesn't look like me.’ But you know, visually, as close as you can to the real person."

Meanwhile, Sahil Vaid's casting as Amit Verma was almost serendipitous. Kukunoor recalled, "It so happened that Sahil had put on a bunch of weight for another movie that he did. And so when he came to audition for me, even the girth matched it. And then I read with Sahil, and he tells me he's from Tamil Nadu, and he's from Salem. So it was like almost the twilight zone when we were chatting. It was that bizarre. But something happened by luck and Sahil's casting was the most beautiful thing because not one Tamilian can tell me that he spoke Tamil wrongly."

Some artistic license was required for some characters, particularly those associated with LTTE. The filmmaker revealed, "With a lot of the LTTE actors, we ended up using Malayali actors because they were people who matched visually up to the characters they were playing. But couldn't necessarily find Tamilians all the time."

Balancing artistic liberty with authenticity

But two things were most important to Kukunoor: real-life appearance and dialect authenticity. The filmmaker concluded by saying, "The characters we had to take liberties with, but at least the big ones, were kind of the ones on whom the show was hanging on, and I tried to be as authentic as possible. I was not concerned about the fact that ‘Oh, you have to get that’ as long as, visually, they landed in the right space. That was the first step. And then second, how well can they do the dialect?"

On Sony LIV (OTTPlay Premium), you can now watch The Hunt: The Rajiv Gandhi Assassination Case.