Performer and actor, Afran Nisho is a familiar face in the television industry in Bangladesh. He started off his acting journey in 2000 and since then, he has under his belt countless TVCs and dramas. Some of his noted performances were in Joker, Tumi na Thakle and Indiscipline. As he preps for his upcoming Eid drama Premeri Ronge Rangano directed by Mohammad Mostafa Kamal Raz, we catch up with him while he discusses the changing trends of the entertainment industry.
After earning accolades from his fans, Nisho still has the rush to do better and grow as an actor. “I always strive to be a good actor, be it the main lead or other characters, it’s equally important to me. For me, it’s not about bagging the role of a hero all the time, but adding different characters to my bucket.” he starts off. Nisho has grown up watching dramas and observed that although there are some technological improvements in this area, the audience’s hunger for good roles and solid performance is still at its peak. “The look and the feel of the dramas are definitely better now. Script writers and directors are now developing more versatile content than ever before, the technical support has improved massively as well, giving an opportunity to actors and directors to try out different methods, which is great,” he shares. However there are issues that put a crimp in the industry. “It bothers me to see the kind of negative feedback towards performances these days; the common complaint being that they are ‘not like before’.” Nisho feels otherwise and goes on to say that due to the abundance of channels and commercials, they are probably missing out on good dramas because people can’t be watching all the channels at the same time. “It’s like, if you have biryani everyday, it won’t feel like biryani anymore. It will be a regular meal.” Nisho shares that at a time when the competition is off the roof between channels, it is surely commendable when someone does become a big star. “Before, people would wait for that one weekly drama; nowadays there are dramas in every channel. Actors today need to work even harder to get the feedback stars used to get back in the day.”
On hindsight, he states that the industry today is more commercially driven as a result it lacks certain values. There is a lack of proper makeup artists and script writers; sometimes just to get the project going, non-actors too become actors. “Riding on the popularity bandwagon, directors are now casting the same actors in several projects to make them more sellable, regardless of the fact that the said actors may not be suitable for the parts.” Nevertheless, Nisho understands that making money is important, but there should be stories and scripts that revolve around our culture, historical events and art- things that are unique to us only. “That’s the only way we can save this art form and not let it fade away,” he concludes.