In an interview with The Hindu, the Delhi-born actor talks about landing the coveted role after several auditions, his friendship with co-star Park Hee-soo and his mother’s reaction to overnight stardom
Anupam Tripathi talks about the smash-hit Korean show squid game Which has brought him into the limelight. “The love of people around the world has not stopped,” he says, all smiles.
The Delhi-born actor plays Contestant 199 Ali Abdul, an undocumented migrant worker from Pakistan, who joins 455 other debt-ridden contestants as they run away with a fatal twist in a series of children’s games. take; All for a hefty cash prize.
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Amidst all the deceit and deceit squid gameAnupam’s Ali is an extraordinarily cute character that the internet has collectively picked up.
Casting an actor to play Ali was something the show’s director Hwang Dong-hyuk was concerned about, and in a Netflix interview after the show’s release, he said that Anupam Tripathi appeared ‘out of the blue’ .
“He was fluent in Korean and could act. His emotional range was amazing,” Dong-hyuk said, all praise for the actor. Born and raised in Delhi, Anupam moved to South Korea after securing a scholarship to study acting.
Anupam landed the role after several rounds of auditions, and says it was then he realized how different Ali’s role would be compared to his previous on-screen performances.
“I started thinking about the similarities as well as the differences Ali and I shared. At first, Ali was a healthy person and needed to look like someone in whom to compete and do well in sports. So I worked hard on my body and gained 6 kgs,” recalls the actor, who has been living in South Korea for the past 11 years.
Anupam says he relied on articles and documentaries to learn more about migrant workers in South Korea and around the world. “These are very real things that are happening all over the world. I kept on meeting people, reading about them and watching documentaries to play Ali on screen,” he says.
Being fluent in Korean also meant that Anupam had to work on his dialogue delivery, given that the character he was playing was probably in South Korea for less than a year.
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“It was hard to go back and undo things,” he says with a laugh. “I looked for friends from abroad who had recently come to South Korea to chat with them.”
Ali is first introduced on the show in the middle of a terrifying red light, green light game as he heroically saves his fellow contestant Seong Gi-hyun (Lee Jung-jae) from elimination.
“I remember Jung-jae telling me to just go ahead and be free, and to express myself as I wanted to. He helped me a lot as an actor and the whole team did that. Shared a great chemistry,” he says.
However, the scenes in Anupam’s other contestant Cho Sang-woo (played by Park Hee-soo) have received much praise. Park Hee-soo, he says, was a sympathetic co-star, and the two spent a lot of time together off-camera.
“When I asked him for feedback, he used to do the same to me, and it was very surprising because he is such a famous actor. It was the relationship we shared; there was a constant exchange of ideas,” Anupam miss.
While he has played small roles in popular K-dramas such as descendants of the sun And hospital playlist Among others, Anupam hopes that squid game Diverse characters are beginning to be given prominence on screen and will influence the way stories are told.
“In my personal opinion, all kinds of characters will be seen and I am also working hard so that this change can happen in future. Going forward, I can play any character. action or rom-com; I am eager to take everything,” he says, speaking about the representation on screen.
Anupam also narrates (with a hint of disbelief in his voice). After the release of the show on Netflix, he saw a steady increase in the number of his Instagram followers. “On September 17th, there were about 3,000 people… and every hour after 4 pm, I saw the number of followers increasing. People were talking about Ali everywhere, and it was fascinating to see!” he smiles.
The actor now has over 3.4 million followers, and many pictures from the sets of the show are with his co-stars. As evident from the many such pictures shared by the ensemble, Anupam reflects on the warmth shared by all of them, and describes the experience as “very funny”.
What is her family’s reaction to her character becoming popular on the show and around the world? He breaks down in Hindi and replies that his mother in Delhi tells him to enjoy his success, but keep his feet firmly on the ground. “He is very proud. Everyone is very proud and happy,” Anupam indicated.
Squid Game Streaming on Netflix
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