After his web series Humble Politician Nograj (2022), a sequel to his 2018 movie by the same name, many have been wondering what Saad Khan has been up to. Well... he was working on something that is finally out. The latest from him is Constable Girpade, a series which is now streaming.
The series is a comedy, a genre which Khan is mostly known for. “Before Nograj I did a drama. I’ve also done a crime thriller. I have explored different genres but I think I have been able to get a good response from comedy. I always believe that making comedy is a serious business. At the backend, when you’re writing comedy, you have to be very cautious because you have to be intelligent about it,” says Khan. He further adds, “Luckily for me, because of years of doing improv comedy on stage and doing multiple videos, it has helped me a lot.” Khan reveals that his next project is going to be a romantic comedy.
However, what makes him really proud of Constable Girpade is when people reach out to him for making a ‘clean comedy show without any bad words, without any double meanings’. Khan says he likes to take time for his projects since he does his own research. “When I cast these characters I knew I wanted people who were born and brought up in Maharashtra because these are Bombay cops. I was born and brought up in Bengaluru, so it is easy for me to portray a Karnataka cop. When I was in the writing process, I went to a lot of police stations in Mumbai and met a number of cops. I understood how they speak, and got a hold of their mannerisms,” says Khan, adding that small nuances in the show are from his leg-work.
Having done movies, web series, and social media content, Khan’s works have struck a chord with his audience. He believes that the audience doesn’t have much of an attention span. “To capture their mind space, you have to make something that stands out. I always believe that the trailer is the first thing that
the audience sees right before they even decide whether they want to watch a show. You’ve to pump in
everything that you have and then make the best possible,” says Khan.
However, he says, they still can’t predict what format works well with consumers. “There are short-format contents, there are also series with 50-60 minutes episodes. During Covid, many said that people wouldn’t go to theatres, but now people are going back. If the content is doing what it is supposed to do, then the audience will not care about the duration. They will watch,” he asserts.