She is known as much for her choice of scripts as for her acting prowess. From Qissa and Manto to Mirzapur and Delhi Crime, Rasika Dugal has slowly but steadily built an enviable filmography. However, the actor feels “it has been anything but easy to construct a diverse showcase”.

“There are days when I have to reject work because the scripts are bad. It’s painful to read a bad script because I feel like my sensibilities are getting scarred. If I read five bad scripts, by the sixth one, I wonder whether I am liking it because it’s good or because the five before it were bad. That rattles me a bit,” says the actor, who has diversified her filmography with the genre of horror this time around.

Dugal, who is playing a student counsellor in the Gauravv K Chawla and Ananya Banerjee-helmed series Adhura, says the show gave her sleepless nights as she easily gets spooked. “The last horror film that I watched was when I was 10, and the next one that I saw was Adhura! When I read the script, I thanked the creators. ‘You have taken away my single recourse to fear—switching on lights at night,’” she laughs.

The Amazon Prime Video series, Dugal says, “goes beyond jump scares”. It was an opportunity to explore themes of grief in the garb of a horror show.

“It is a moving story about [everything] that happens in society. The unresolved sadness [in the story] made it harder to sleep at night. One day on shoot, Gauravv said, ‘You are a great horror series actor because you actually get scared, so your reactions are natural,’” shares the actor, adding that she has always been intrigued by horror as a genre.

“I feel it’s an extremely interesting tool through which you can say a lot about your fears. It is about unfinished conversations and unresolved grief. That, to me, is more painful.”

Call it an irrational fear or not, but for Rasika Dugal, the genre of supernatural horror sends a shiver down her spine. So much so that she has no qualms accepting that she hasn’t watched any scary film or series. “The last [psychological thriller] I watched was 100 days [1991] that featured Madhuri Dixit-Nene. I just shut the genre out of my head post that,” says Dugal, who wrapped up her first horror thriller Adhura, in May.

The decision to take up the series was a way for the actor to “conquer my fears”, but it was definitely not something that came easily to her. “When my director asked me to watch a few sequences, I refused because it was too scary for me. I am a phattu [scaredy-cat]. I asked them if it could wait because my husband [Mukul Chadda] was out of town and I didn’t want to come back to an empty house after that. Furthermore, I wanted to try this genre and see how it works out for me,” she says of the series that sees her playing a school counsellor.

Dugal credits directors Gaurav Chawla and Ananya Banerjee for guiding her through the project, but claims that sometimes she couldn’t comprehend their explanations. “To dispense logic and understand a scene, Ananya would tell me, ‘Like in a horror film…’, but I would look blankly at her because I had no [reference in my head]. I would tell her, ‘I don’t know what that means,” jokes Dugal, adding, “Gaurav and Ananya are two talented directors and I had a ball working with them.”

Sometimes, it takes years for upcoming actors to collaborate with someone whose work they deeply admire. Ishwak Singh is third time lucky in that regard. The actor teamed up with director Nikkhil Advani for his short film in 'Unpaused' (2020), following it up with the wonderful 'Rocket Boys' earlier this year. Now, the two have reunited for the supernatural thriller, 'Adhura' that also stars Rasika Dugal. That Advani has trusted him with the series reassures Singh that he is headed in the right direction.

He says, “It is every actor’s wish to work with directors whose work they have looked up to, and Nikkhil sir is that director on my list. We have all seen 'Kal Ho Naa Ho' (2003), which was ahead of its time. I feel lucky that he picked me not once, but thrice. I share a comfort level with him.”

It was initially difficult for the actor to navigate the world of the Amazon Prime Video series, owing to its genre. “Supernatural is a tough genre to crack. That’s where I used imagination as a tool. Once I was aware of the rules of [filming] a supernatural [offering], it became easy for me to visualise and convince myself of the horrors. I’d take time to get out of that distressed state of mind.”

Attempting a new genre teaches one new lessons. Singh says it has enriched him as an artiste. “This character has given me a lot. I feel better equipped as an actor after having done this series.”