By Sanya Pandey

New Delhi, Jan 20 (UNI) Recognised for his roles as Lord Ram in 'Siya Ke Ram', Major Rudra Pratap Ranawat in 'Rangrasiya' and Chandragupta Maurya, Ashish Sharma is all set for his upcoming show 'Prithvi Vallabh', to be aired on Sony Entertainment from Saturday night.

Talking to UNI, Ashish, who was in Delhi to promote his new show, said his character in the show is very flamboyant and full of life.

"My character of Prithvi Vallabh is very flamboyant. He is full of life. He is intense, because somewhere I bring in that aspect of mine,it's my individual trait.I tend to bend them into little intense, because I think that grasp viewers also, so I try to give little gravity to my characters, even if they are flamboyant and funny, There is a decent amount of density in them so this makes the characters more grippy," the actor said.

Telling about his character and preparations for the role, the actor said,"the name Prithvi Vallabh comes with a lot of weightage. And usual we haven't heard or seen about him. So keeping in mind whatever we have read about him in history or the literature we had on him, as we don't have much about him, we have created a fictionalised world around him, and the character itself."

"A lot of things went into it, physicality of it, the mindset of the character. Physically we wanted him to look very Indian predominantly, because usually what we see in serials or films when we talk about a warrior/king, we see a heaven image and created with a popular belief, that they have a six pack abs -- it's very western concept, very Greek.

The descriptions we get in Indian things is not this image. Indian warrior/kings never looked liked them--they were beefy,bulky, had broad shoulder, they were very Indian 'Pehelwan,desi' physique. So that's what we tried to achieve physically in this. Mindset wise he was a Sufi guy, poet,artist, he never believed in war, so we brought that 'sufiana andaaz' yet not keep him detached,yet keep him attached to the audience, and to the life, So that's what the preparation went into,' he said.

Asked whether his character was inspired by 'Baahubali', Ashish said,"No, nothing like that. 'Baahubali' is a different world altogether. This is written. 'Baahubali' is complete fiction. This is there in history books, the story is there, the character is there, we have not added anything, He was a poet. There is a compilation of his poems where one gets to know about his description.So if he was a sufi, poet, warrior, lover it's all there in the history-it's not fiction."

Ashish who has a penchant for writing poems, said Producer Anirudh Pathak has used his real poems in the show.

'The Writer-Producer knew about my love for poems. One day we were rehearsing the scene, and I came up with few lines, which they really liked it and used it in the show. Slowly it became a pattern. So, there were many creative liberties given. The whole process is very creative, because you have like-minded people, the team is such, and that's why these small things that we incorporated and there are lot more to see once you see the show," he said.

Asked whether he is interested in doing light-hearted show, the 'Chandragupta Maurya' fame actor said,"I would love to do anything. Post 'Siya ke Ram' I wanted to do something flamboyant, something away from that genre, that zone of 'Ram', and this is exactly what it is. It is completely starkly opposite to those characters I played earlier. I would love to do light-hearted roles in future."

Without revealing much about his future projects, Ashish said,"Post 'Prithvi Vallabh' there are couple of very intersting things which will be disclosed later."

'Prithvi Vallabh -- Itihaas Bhi, Rahasya Bhi' has been produced by Anirudh Pathak and the production company is Writer's Galaxy.

The story revolves around the life journey of two kings: Prithvi Vallabh, king of Avantipur, a kind and peaceful man, and Tailap, the neighboring king, who is very cruel. Prithvi is captured and imprisoned. He falls in love with Tailap's sister Mrinalvati played by Sonarika Bhadoria.

The story is based on the book of Gujarati writer Kanhaiyalal Munshi. It is the first production of Sony Pictures Networks India's sub-branch, SET Originals.

The show will comprise of two seasons, each having 40 episodes.

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