Sudhanshu Pandey says sometimes playing Vanraj is emotionally taxing: You’ve to keep in mind that this is just a character

Sudhanshu Pandey as Vanraj in Rajan Shahi’s Anupamaa has become a household name. The actor feels overwhelmed with all the love and support coming his way. After all, Vanraj is not a typical hero.

“There are sides to Vanraj. He is a multi-dimensional character. Whenever you have seen him getting very angry, there is always another side of him, where you will see him shed a tear for his family or his children. There is a very vulnerable side to him and the balance has been struck very beautifully. And the story shows both sides in such a way that the audiences at one point will get very angry with his behaviour, but at the next moment, they will also feel that he is not wrong. There are so many things to Vanraj’s character that generates and seeks love from people,” he explains the part.

About how emotionally taxing it is to portray those scenes where we see Vanraj in a bad light, Sudhanshu says that as a performer such things does affect one at times.  “Yes, at various points it does hit you.  You have to tell yourself that this is just a negative character that you are playing. There are times that people also send hateful messages and then you have to tell yourself that it’s okay as they are sending hateful messages not to you but to your character. You have to be very careful of how you absorb it. You must understand that as an actor when you play a certain character there will be certain reactions to it and if they are reacting well and appreciating then that’s always a good thing,” he adds.

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In the present scheme of things in the show, the audience is seeing a completely different side of Vanraj. He is shown to be very calm and composed. “Well, there is always a lull before a storm. So whenever you see Vanraj being very calm, quiet, very nice and understanding there will always be something waiting to happen.  At the moment all I can say is that there is a lot of drama that is going to happen. Whether it’s definitely going to be Vanraj doing something very negative, I won’t say that but it’s going to be the circumstances and he is right now in a very focused state of mind as he has to make it big at any cost because now he wants to do it for the family. He has done enough damage to the family and everything around it. Vanraj now wants to fix everything. He has always lived for his family,” he says.