What makes Gaitonde click? Varun Grover decodes 'Sacred Games' and its protagonists
A fictional character every now and then acquires real life overtones, eclipsing the star enacting the role on TV or cinema. Something like that happened in Kenya with the "Sacred Games" crew which managed to access a location thanks primarily to 'Ganesh Gaitonde'.
The gangster-philosopher, played by Nawazuddin Siddiqui in the first season of the Netflix drama and also in the second that drops down on Thursday, opened doors for the team in far away Kenya, said the show's lead writer Varun Grover.
"There was some shoot in Kenya and they were not getting the location. The person there got to know that Gaitonde would be shooting so they immediately agreed. They were like 'Okay, Gaitonde is coming so we are giving you the location'," he said.
The star in this case had been overshadowed by the character.
What makes Gaitonde -- who along with Sartaj Singh, a police officer played by Saif Ali Khan, is the pivot of the show -- so compelling is his part-gangster, part philosopher personality, .