Kubbra Sait on OTT: You don’t have to be a bankable star to be a part of a bankable story

Starting off as a host, Kubbra Sait was looking for more when acting happened. She started off with Ready (2011) and did a number films before web also opened up. In 2018, the character of Kukoo happened in Sacred Games, which marked a new beginning for Sait.

“I was just trying to run away from my stage performances because somewhere I felt saturated. And I think I was lucky to have been approached for a part that is going to unravel itself to the OTT platform. I had no idea what the impact is going to be. Kukoo became Kukoo because of every single person who made Sacred Games happen,” she says, adding OTT has broken all story related stereotypes. 

“There was this format, a good and a bad guy, a girl. Good guy defeats the bad guy. The story ends. Plus the story would also accommodate song and dance. While doing that in a two-hour-long film it was getting repetitive. OTT actually focus on stories, gives freedom for characters to develop,” adds the actor.

She continues, “You don’t have to be a bankable star to be a part of a bankable story on OTT. Concept of stars existed for way too long in India, OTT is breaking that and creating stars out of every good performer… Every part is an important cog in a story. And every cog in the story has a personality.”

With popular film actors joining OTT bandwagon, many have been pointing out how the monopoly of stars that exist in films are creeping into OTT and making it difficult for others to break into the space. Sait feels, “Doesn’t matter who you are, there’s equal space for everyone. The viewing experience is not just silver screen, but one can watch it on TV and other devices. So there’s no larger-than-life representation, everything boils down to only performances. Characters aren’t defined by number of minutes spent on screen. This kind of democratic viewing is letting the audience decide the actors and stories they want to see more of.”

Now there is a bigger responsibility is on the part of actors. “You work on the web is going to be there forever. Anyone can pull out an embarrassing shoddy job done in the past, so you’ve to be careful,” she ends.

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Author tweets @Shreya_MJ