Entertainment is the key: Producer Sandiip Sikcand

Multi faceted Sandiip Sikcand has come a long way!!! A boon to the television industry, Sandiip has given his best as an actor, creative head and producer. His latest offering on Star Plus’ Dhhai Kilo Prem in association with Balaji Telefilms has already won appreciations. Sandiip has a long association with Balaji Telefilms, helmed by Ekta Kapoor. In a conversation with us, Sandiip recalls how Balaji happened to him. He said, “I had started a theatre group that turned out pretty well. Later, I got introduced to Ekta Kapoor. I was willing to play the role of chacha or fufa or any kind of a role but she offered me to be the creative head. I started off with a show on DD National, Kayamat and then Kahani happened, and it worked out fine and then other shows followed. I took the liberty to play brief roles in a few of them.” Sandiip has acted in movies as well, and his role of Nirmala Pandit in the movie Murder 2 will always be remembered by the audience. Talking about his experience of the same, he added, “Nirmala Pandit was one of the best and most challenging characters that I have done. In fact, I remember when Mohit Suri had called me for this role, he told me that they wanted late Sadashiv Amrapurkar for the role, but he thought about me because of his ill health. This was like a huge compliment for me.” “It was tough doing the role because wearing a saree, make-up and wig was very tiresome but Mohit made it really easy for me and it feels awesome to be still recognized as Nirmala Pandit,” he added. Being a mastermind for many TV shows, Sandiip recently explored the space of web series that took the young audiences by storm. Talking about the same, he said, “Entertainment is the key no matter in which the form. It can be the stage, serial, movie or web series. Web series are great and I am in love with some shows that I see on Netflix. ALT Balaji has come up with some truly superb shows and I think it just increases the bar and I would love to see the avenues of story-telling, growing.” Keep up the good work, Sandiip.