One of the few adaptations of international series where the writers have managed to create a regional texture and political context without losing the veneer of the original, The Night Manager serves both the desi audience seeking a global experience as well as those who love to play ‘match the following’ with the Hindi version and the British original that is itself based on John le Carré’s novel.
Usually, in adaptations, the soul of the source becomes sacrosanct. Here, the show creators Sandeep Modi and Shridhar Raghavan make us feel as if they have transplanted a South Asian soul while retaining the polished body of the original.
Four episodes of the series were released in February this year wherein we watched the rise of Shaan (Aditya Roy Kapur) from an ex-army officer working as a night manager in a Dhaka hotel to an undercover agent after he could not save the child bride of a debauch Bangladeshi ally of an arms dealer Shelly Rungta (Anil Kapoor) who lives in the guise of a businessman dealing in agricultural products and working for humanitarian issues.
The Night Manager (Hindi)
Enabled by a few good officers in the Indian intelligence agency, Shaan gets drawn into a web of espionage, where his task is to infiltrate Shelly’s syndicate and bring down his monstrous empire. It is hard to win Shelly’s trust but it is even more difficult to convince his friend Brijpal (Saswata Chatterjee). In the process, Shaan gets besotted with Shelly’s enigmatic wife Kaveri (Sobhita Dhulipala) and stands up for his son Taha.
Modi’s astute treatment of the material ensured that the curiosity to know the result of Shaan’s pursuit of Shelly didn’t subside in the flood of content on the OTT platforms. In the final three episodes, released this week, he cuts to the chase and unravels why Shelly is indispensable for the top leadership and whether Shaan will live up to the trust that his handlers have reposed in him. The hour-long episodes offer a delicious reading of global politics where non-state actors are hired and propped up to do the dirty work. But when greed gets the better of them, they often forget the so-called national interest they signed up for. As the series progresses, we find that there is not one Shelly in the business of sponsoring war as an unnamed merchant of death (Prashant Narayanan) seems even more ruthless and chilling in his sinister endeavours.
We could very well guess where the narrative is headed but it is the ‘how’ part — burnished with sharp dialogues (Akshat Ghildial and Shantanu Shrivastava) and immersive performances — that keeps us hooked.
The competent cast builds on the good work of the first part and ensures the storytelling doesn’t descend into the pretentious zone. It is hard to look away when Kapoor snarls at the prospect of being cheated by those whom he trusted. Or when Aditya and Sobhita set the screen on fire with their brooding intensity. The tonality of the series where you hide more than you express suits Aditya. Sobhita’s face can carry a hundred secrets, and here again, she is in no hurry to reveal them. It is hard to figure out who is more seductive between the two.
Then there is Saswata who once again shows his class. The restaurant brawl scene where he evokes an uneasy combination of petulance and the pain of losing his friend’s faith stays with you. In between the macho men, the industrious Tillotama Shome stands out. As the heavily pregnant intelligence officer who is in hot pursuit of Shelly, Tillotama builds Lipika brick by brick as a sassy and snarky professional who surprises her opponents and allies with her audacity. The actor lends an art house finesse to a character that belongs to the pulp fiction space. For once, she plays to the gallery but at the same time keeps a window open to showcase the inner dialogue that is going on inside Lipika’s head for those who care to scratch the surface.
The Night Manager Part 2 is currently streaming on Disney+ Hotstar
