NEW DELHI: Hollywood’s fascination with white lead heroes is now giving way to diverse and colour-blind characters, says Indian-American star Aasif Mandvi, who believes his own casting as pragmatist Ben Shakir on CBS series “Evil” is a proof of this evolution.
The series, which hails from Robert and Michelle King of “The Good Wife” and “The Good Fight” fame, is led by three actors from different groups — women, African Americans and South Asians — who have often been treated poorly by the industry.
In an interview with PTI over a Zoom call, Aasif said it makes him happy that there are more opportunities for people of colour in Hollywood today.
“The good news is that we’ve come a long way and you see that the culture in Hollywood has changed. We’re now in a place where there is much more willingness to cast people of colour and non-white actors in roles that would have been played by white actors traditionally,” the actor said.
Aasif, who is best known for starring in movies such as “The Proposal”, “Ghost Town” and “Today’s Special”, said his character in “Evil” was originally envisioned as a white person but the Kings decided to make him a South Asian-American.
“Ben was originally written as a white guy. It became actually more interesting for the Kings to write a character who was South Asian but also came from a Muslim family. I think it added a complexity and a layer that they hadn’t originally envisioned.”
In “Evil”, he stars alongside Katja Herbers and Mike Colter. The show is about forensic psychologist Kristin and priest-in-training David who team up to investigate supernatural incidents.
Aasif’s Ben is often a reasonable and practical voice for the other two whenever things don’t make sense to them.
“Ben is actually the true pragmatist. He is a scientist and a person who doesn’t believe in religious mumbo jumbo, as he would call it. He is a person who only believes in what he can smell, taste, touch and feel. Among the trio, he is the one who is the most earthbound.”
“Evil” will air on Zee Cafe SD and HD on weekdays at 2 pm.
Aasif, 55, said that the direct result of the creators’ decision to change the character’s ethnicity opened doors to further develop his personality and discover his faith.
“They asked me, ‘What are you?’ I told them that I’m a Muslim. So they said, ‘Well, let’s make Ben a Muslim.’ So that also created a whole bunch of stories and things that they can then mine. They wouldn’t have been able to do it if he was just a white guy.”
Being born in Mumbai before his parents shifted to the UK and later to the US, Aasif is well-aware of how Indians deal with superstition and supernatural stuff, and he shared some of these stories with Robert King.
“I was able to share with Robert many of the stories from my family growing up in India. Every Indian family has stories of the supernatural or ghosts. My grandmother used to tell us stories of ghosts and ‘bhoot’ from Kapadvanj, Gujarat where she grew up. So I was sharing these stories with Robert and he was so excited. He wanted to include these elements in the show.
“So in season two, people will see a little bit more of Ben’s background and a little bit of those stories. One of the things we talked about was it cannot always be from a Catholic point of view. There are other faiths and other religions that also have these elements and those should be included as well,” the actor added.
Aasif said he doesn’t believe in ghosts and demons but he acknowledges that there are things beyond the understanding of humans.
“I believe there’s a universal intelligence that we don’t understand. There are things outside of what we can see, feel, taste and touch. But are they demons? Are they ghosts? Are they perhaps human ways of trying to explain the unexplainable or what we call the supernatural, which is anything that we can’t explain really?
“So I think there are things outside of our understanding but I don’t know if we can call them a ghoul or a demon.” (AGENCIES)
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