Harshil Shah from Mumbai has been an eminent name in the advertising industry and the New York theatre circuit. Now, the versatile actor shall be seen in ZEE5’s upcoming series ‘Taj: Divided By Blood’.
Harshil is a trained dancer and comes with a professional degree in acting from the Mecca of acting schools, the illustrious NYU Tisch School of Arts and the globally renowned Lee Strasberg Studio. Besides being an actor, he also understands the business aspect of media and comes with a professional expertise in media entertainment and technology. Prior to ‘TAJ: Divided By Blood’, Harshil also worked as an assistant director on projects like ‘Kedarnath’ (2018) and with Rajkumar Hirani Films Pvt. Ltd. for an advertisement.
Harshil also worked with Viacom18 and has been one of the eminent faces for last year’s Jio Dhan Dhana Dhan IPL campaign. With ‘Taj: Divided By Blood’, Harshil is re-affirming his connection with the west, once again as the periodic drama has an entire British and LA based Hollywood crew. The charming actor has also previously been a part of masterclasses to study the intricacies of acting from the iconic Al Pacino and the legendary Sally Field and has been a part of various plays in the New York Theatre circuit.
On the topic of his debut, Harshil shared, “When I went to New York, I had a bucket list of ten things that I wanted to do in my career and one of those was to share screen space with Naseer Sir. Honestly I thank my stars for having done that so early in my career. Naseer sir is an institution in himself. ‘Taj: Divided By Blood’ happened by chance and I am glad it did. It was also a very creatively enriching experience to work with Rahul Bose. When Rahul sir is around, you just know that you are going to be taken care of. He encouraged me and held my hand through the entirety of the shoot. I am very grateful to him for being so kind.”
Talking about his character in the series, Harshil further stated, “I play a character who is entirely parallel to my real-self. I am a typical boy-next-door, a SoBo boy whereas my character is a Mughal prince at war with his family and himself. To do justice to Afrasiyab character from Taj, I had to prepare thoroughly. Firstly, I was required to have a natively authentic flow in Urdu, learn how to ride a horse and swing a sword. My character is a young and conflicted Mughal Prince who is forced by circumstances to fight for his family.”
‘Taj: Divided By Blood’ is produced by ZZEE5, Contiloe’s Abhimanyu Singh and Roopali Kadyan. It stars Dharmendra, Naseeruddin Shah, Aditi Rao Hydari, Sandhya Mridul, Zareena Wahab, Aashim Gulati, Subodh Bhave, debutant Shubham Kumar Mehra and Rahul Bose. Harshil will be seen playing Rahul Bose’s on-screen son, Afrasiyab.
The trailer of the royal web series has already garnered a stupendous response across digital platforms.
