In July 1995, the country was shaken by the Tandoor murder case, in which MLA Sushil Sharma had shot wife Naina Sahni to death and disposed off her body in a clay oven at a Delhi restaurant. A quarter of a century later, the horrific episode has inspired the Tanuj Virwani-led series, Tandoor. The Ullu series sees the actor playing a politician who is on the run after he is suspected of killing his wife, essayed by Rashami Desai.

For Virwani, it wasn’t as much the shock value of the crime that drew him to the project as it was the opportunity to explore a grey role. Ask him if he judged the character for the heinous crime, and he says, “I try not to judge my character, no matter how nasty he may be. Only then will you be able to surrender yourself to becoming that person. [The story is] based on real-life [people]; approaching such stories comes with an added sense of responsibility. This role affected me more than anything I have done so far.”