Aanand L. Rai suggested Anjumm Shharma his 1st acting workshop

MUMBAI: Actor Anjumm Shharma, who is awaiting the release of his upcoming streaming series ‘Sultan of Delhi’, earlier worked as an assistant director to Aanand L. Rai, in the initial phase of the career.

It was during the scripting of the superhit film ‘Tanu Weds Manu part 1’ that Anjumm decided to make a move into acting.

In fact, it was the ‘Atrangi Re’ director who pushed Anjumm for his first workshop.

Talking about the same, Anjumm said: "This was the time when Aanand sir was scripting 'Tanu Weds Manu part 1' and I had thought of moving ahead. While I was assisting him, I had decided that I want to explore and venture into the work of performing arts. I remember telling him one afternoon that I want to pursue acting. In fact, he only suggested my first ever acting workshop. Soon after two months of the acting workshop, I started giving auditions across various mediums -- films, ads and television."

Soon the actor bagged two big shows on television but decided to let them go because he felt he needed to work more on himself as an actor.

The actor said: "I got two leading television shows as a lead but I turned it down because I believed I was still not ready, instead I started doing theatre. Everyone around me highly criticised this decision as I had declined a supposedly big television offer. But call it my stubbornness or clarity, I know if I want to pursue acting, I need to be trained."

Talking about his transition from theatre to films, Anjumm said: "It was smooth. I was very content when I was working extensively in theatre. I enjoyed it and learnt a lot and because of that I met Bejoy Nambiar and he offered me ‘Wazir’ with Amitabh Bachchan and Farhan Akhtar. It was a big leap in my acting career just to work and be around such stalwarts. But that didn't do much for me as an actor. I went back and started doing theatre again, almost starting afresh until another possible opportunity came to me a few years later as the world of entertainment industry underwent a change in terms of OTT and then ‘Mirzapur’ happened."

‘Sultan of Delhi’ is set to stream on Disney+ Hotstar from October 13.