Exclusive: Arjun Mathur, Jim Sarbh on the loaded Made In Heaven Season 2, intimate scenes and more

After four long years, Made In Heaven – Zoya Akhtar and Reema Kagti’s series about two upstart wedding planners navigating another shaadi season in Delhi has returned for a Season 2. Featuring Sobhita Dhulipala, Arjun Mathur, Jim Sarbh, Kalki Koechlin and others in a star-studded ensemble, the show takes on some heavy subjects. The bigger the weddings, the bigger the drama. In an exclusive interview, Arjun Mathur and Jim Sarbh opened up about modern marriages, that steamy gay threesome and more.

We’re always told marriages are made in heaven. Did you buy into that growing up?

Jim: It’s sold to you when you’re younger, right? There’s this idea of togetherness, foreverness and marriage being the best day of your life. It’s sold more to women than to men in general. I don’t know how much I really thought about it when I was younger, but I must have believed it. There’s a romantic, sentimental and sappy side to me as well. As you get a bit older, you start to actually look at how marriages are unfolding. And you’re a bit like it’s complicated, it’s not as simple as it looks. It takes work and it’s a partnership. It’s not some beautiful, everlasting emotion at all points. Sometimes it’s just the drudgery of daily life. Why didn’t you take out the trash? And things like that.

Arjun: It’s basic conditioning coming down from generations of a family. Greeting cards and Bollywood and all of it is contributing to these ideas of romance. What gave me a reality check was perhaps getting married and divorced. I suppose that kind of broke any grave importance that I gave to either of the two. Now I believe in a deeper kind of love.

How much of a challenge is it to reprise a role and explore your characters further?

Jim: You’ve already built the character, so you don’t have to spend all the hard work now in grounding the character. You can start thinking about what flavour you want to leave the audience with at the end of every scene and how that will overall affect your character throughout the show. There’s comfort and familiarity. There’s confidence in knowing my character’s rhythms. Now, do I want to break them? Do I want to play with them? Do they need to be exactly as they were? Those joys are also challenges in different ways. It’s like “I see the purpose of this within the framework of the larger story, but do I really want to do it?” And then the battle between those two things is also quite interesting because then you have to do it in a way that will surprise you. It’s not something you might necessarily have chosen for your character at the moment.

Arjun: There’s a joy in knowing that you got this and you can expand on it. The pitfall would also be that I suppose in some situations you could be going back to a character but not necessarily be expanding. I guess you could get bored, but if the character is something that has genuinely connected and left a mark, then you want to go back to it. If the character was not memorable to begin with, then what’s the joy in going back to that, you know? Unless you’re just bound by contract you wouldn’t want to return to a forgettable role.

Arjun, do you worry about getting representation right or wonder if you’re educated enough to take on a homosexual character?

Arjun: I don’t need to be educated at all to play a character first of all. I just played the character. What I have said is that there may be better voices than mine because I’m just an actor playing a character. There may be artists more suited to take on that responsibility. It’s just a matter of chance that I’m in this spot. I guess it symbolises something for a lot of people and I respect that a lot. I’d say Trinetra is so much better suited to actually take on that responsibility and actually be a voice of some value at things like the panels which I was invited to quite a bit after season one. So I don’t take any other pressure than portraying the emotions of this character as truthfully as I can.

Jim: Yeah, and he can trust that the makers and the creators have so much experience with members of the LGBTQ+ community. They ensured he was in safe hands to just try to play the scene as honestly as possible. Knowing that the overall kind of politics or portrayal is respectful, interesting and dynamic

There’s a threesome in the show. What went into choreographing that and what are some of the thoughts that go through your mind while filming something like that?

Arjun: I was fortunate that my intimate scenes in the show this season were all directed by Zoya Akhtar. She did not need an intimacy coordinator on set. We were very fortunate there. It is important to make sure that it is beautiful and that you actually feel tenderness. And thoughts going through my head are like, when is dinner? It’s nothing spectacular like it’s.

Jim: Oh yes, you just have working actor thoughts.

Jim, your character had so many moments of raw emotion. What was your understanding of Aadil’s story this season?

Jim: It’s firing on all cylinders. It seems like every conversation he has is mired with, “What just happened?” moments. This season, it feels Aadil is realising and discovering things. It feels like he’s fighting very hard to stay clawed onto a ship that is no longer in his control. He’s just trying with sheer will to still pretend to be the captain, but he’s just not. That’s how I kind of view this season and where he is emotionally.

Since the show has such a great ensemble cast, what are some of the qualities you’d want to steal from your co-stars?

Arjun: I want Jim’s quick wit and Shashank’s ability to not give a f***.

Jim: Yeah, I love Mathur’s commitment to a moment. He really just goes for it. It doesn’t seem like he’s worried too much about anything apart from playing that moment out in whatever way that it requires. Mona has those very good headlamp eyes that she can turn on and really let us into her inner workings while also being able to turn quite ferocious very quickly afterwards. Sobhita has this nice fixed gaze that she can hold people under. Like a cat looking at prey. There’s Shashank’s nonchalance, Shivani’s comic timing and her ability to just deliver lines that I can imagine someone else not quite delivering in the same way because she’s caught the character so well. Even some of the people that just dropped in are so brilliant. Every episode has little things you wanna steal from the actors. There’s a great shot in Neeraj Ghaywan’s episode where Radhika Apte turns into the frame. It’s a slightly odd angle so you feel you’re with her. In that moment she questions her own beliefs. It’s beautiful because up until now you haven’t seen any cracks in this person. It’s like you can be 100 per cent right and still have doubts creep in. It’s so confusing to have really strong stances on anything in the modern world because you’re constantly being tested upon them by anyone that disagrees with you, they’ll. Arjun’s character also goes through the whole season like that. You know you’re right and yet you feel so guilty and confused.

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