New Delhi, Sep 10 (IANS): Actor Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub, who plays the love interest of Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s transgender character of Harika in crime drama ‘Haddi’, spoke about his role, and said that the basic idea was to communicate the concept of true love between people irrespective of gender.

Directed by Akshat Ajay Sharma, the film stars Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Anurag Kashyap, and Zeeshan in the lead. Nawaz plays the character of Haddi/Harika, while Zeeshan is seen as Irfan.

Talking to IANS, Zeeshan spoke on the mental and physical toll such characters take on the actors.

“I don’t think there is any such toll on you. Some things of the character remain with you. There is always a give and take. It's not a very intense but nice and tender character. And we had to achieve that softness. A tenderness should remain in their relationship,” he said.

“Romance should not be a special romance, it is just romance. Koi bhi kisi se bhi pyaar karta hoga, kisi bhi sex k person se, jo jiski preference ho, bas pyaar hai, pure hai. That was the basic idea and that should be communicated. So we worked around it,” shared the ‘Tandav’ fame actor.

Did he had any apprehensions regarding the role?

“There were no apprehensions, but it was an exciting part. It took time to say yes but it was for different reasons. It took around two months, there were date issues. Finally everything was resolved and it happened,” Zeeshan said.

Produced by Zee Studios along with Anandita Studios, the film stars Nawazuddin in a double role, one of which is transgender. It also stars Ila Arun, Saurabh Sachdeva, Rajesh Kumar and Ivanka Das in pivotal roles. It is streaming on Zee5.

On the work front, Zeeshan was last seen in ‘Scoop’ where he played the character of Imran Siddiqui. The show stars Karishma Tanna, Harman Baweja, and Prosenjit Chatterjee.