Five years after putting his Sherlockian skills to use in Raat Akeli Hai, Nawazuddin Siddiqui returns as tenacious small-town cop Jatil Yadav in Raat Akeli Hai: The Bansal Murders. Premiering on Netflix today, the dark thriller — directed by Honey Trehan — brings back Nawaz and Radhika Apte from the first film and introduces new players in the form of Chitrangda Singh, Revathy, Rajat Kapoor, Deepti Naval, Sanjay Kapoor and others. Recently, t2 engaged in a chat with Nawaz, Radhika, Revathy and director Trehan to know more about the familiar yet fresh world of their film.
Nawazuddin and Radhika, you are the only two actors here returning from the first film. In hindsight, what do you think worked for Raat Akeli Hai?
Radhika Apte: I am always glad to revisit the world of Raat Akeli Hai. I have been a big fan. In fact, before the first film dropped, I spoke to both Nawaz (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) and Honey (Trehan, director). It was such a great conversation and, of course, later a great film.
Honey Trehan: It was the amount of love and praise that Raat Akeli Hai got that prompted Netflix to say: “We can look at expanding this franchise with Jatil (the character played by Nawaz) in a Sherlock Holmes kind of way.” I spoke to Smita (Singh, writer) and we started bouncing off a couple of ideas. We landed up with the idea of The Bansal Murders. We narrated it to Netflix and within 20 minutes, they said “yes” to the film.
Radhika: The compliment that stays on in my mind — and this is a funny one, by the way — is how it sa id that I didn’t sound Marathi… that I sounded like I was from the region (small-town Uttar Pradesh).
Nawazuddin Siddiqui: I think the raw, authentic treatment of the story and the slow-burn appeal worked for the first film and made it an instant clutter-breaker.
Honey, the stakes are bigger this time around, the canvas is larger and there are a lot more players in the sequel. Even with a bigger scale, in what ways do you think you have been able to hold on to the core of what Raat Akeli Hai is?
Honey: The world and the genre remain the same, but the idea was never to make ‘Raat Akeli Hai 2’. This is not a carry-forward of the story from the first film. The film is about Jatil and Radha (played by Radhika) and even the latter has evolved to a later stage in her life. This is also a new case and a fresh set of players. I never wanted any similarity with the first film. However, it does retain the noir look and feel that the franchise is known for. Raat Akeli Hai is the larger universe, of course, but The Bansal Murders is an entity in its own right and with its individual standing within it. This is a film with a different treatment from the first.
Nawazuddin Siddiqui in Team Raat Akeli Hai: The Bansal Murders, premiering today on Netflix
Revathy, having entered the world of Raat Akeli Hai with the sequel, what do you think sets it apart from others in the genre?
Revathy: It definitely is a clutter breaker. I watched the first film when it released and then I was only too happy, as an actor, to be approached this time. I was happy to play a character that I haven’t done before. This film really challenged me as an actor and that is getting increasingly rare.
This film also has a bunch of extremely talented actors, including Deeptiji (Naval) and Rajat (Kapoor). The good thing about this script is that each of us had enough space to perform. Honey made sure that we had the space and scope to mould our characters, make them our own and create something for ourselves.
Nawaz and Radhika, this is perhaps only the second time (Nawaz after Gangs of Wasseypur and Radhika after Rakta Charitra) that you have revisited the world of a film. As actors, how did you bring in a certain amount of freshness even while retaining the essence of your characters?
Radhika: The writing in this film already has that freshness. I was moved by how beautifully Smita has written this character… how there is a small shift in her personality and she is evolving to be a different person. The scenes, as a whole, are so nuanced. I remember telling Honey over and over again that the scenes are written so well. It is also great to do them with Nawaz, who is one of the most nuanced actors around. Honey has worked in this industry for so long, I remember auditioning with him (Trehan started out as a casting director) many years ago. He brings out certain details within you as an actor that you perhaps didn’t know you even had.
For me, it has been a joy to work in the Raat Akeli Hai franchise. Sometimes, when you work on certain projects, you come back home so mentally exhausted. But this is a set that I felt refreshed coming back from.
Nawaz: The freshness of this film comes from the fact that you want to know what happened to these characters. When we last met Jatil and Radha at the end of the first film, they were in a train. The audience wants to know what happens next, both with these characters and in Jatil’s journey as a no-nonsense investigator. Having actors like Revathy ma’am and Rajat sir in the same frame has been a huge learning experience. When you work with such actors, then automatically a certain freshness comes into your performance. I would keep observing them and learn from what they brought in as an actors.
In the case of Jatil, he has become more jatil (complex) in many ways. Even the case itself is more complicated than the previous case.
Revathy in the film
The first film was defined by its silences and prolonged takes. Do we get to see the same this time around too?
Nawaz: Yes. Whenever I work with Honey, there is a meaning to everything. Everything that he makes has meaning and even as an audience, one can’t watch it randomly. As an actor, something as simple as shifting an eyeball has a certain meaning in his films. In the Raat Akeli Hai films, every gesture and posture has a loaded meaning. It is extremely enriching as an actor to be able to experience something like this.
Led by Jatil himself, the world of Raat Akeli Hai is powered by flawed characters. How much does that work, even in its thriller format, to up its reliability quotient?
Honey: Yes, that is what makes the character more vulnerable and more acceptable to society. I am completely in awe of these kind of characters because they carry a certain kind of reality.
Nawaz: Jatil’s only focus is to bring out the truth. He doesn’t care whether, in the quest for the truth, he is able to keep his job or not, whether he remains alive or not. In many ways, I feel he is my alter-ego.
Revathy: People on a pedestal don’t exist… it is simply a construct. You don’t really have Gods or demons anymore… everything exists in the grey. Characters with shades have always been interesting to me because the greater challenge lies in playing such people. The character that I play, Dr Panicker, is very interesting in terms of the layers she has.
Finally, your all-time favourites in this genre?
Nawaz: Though it is quite old, I watched a film called The Secret in their Eyes (2015) recently. It is a philosophical thriller and I enjoyed it a lot.
Radhika: A film that very closely reminds me of Raat Akeli Hai is Jewel Thief (1967). The core of the two films is very similar.
Revathy: I really liked a Malayalam film called Kishkindha Kaandam (2024). It is not like Raat Akeli Hai, but there is a very compelling factor in the film that makes you question what happened and why it happened. It is a beautifully told mystery.
