Mumbai, Jun 15 (IANS): Director Priyanka Ghose, of the new series "Broken But Beautiful 3", says she deliberately didn't watch lead actor Sidharth Shukla's previous works before directing him.

"I had heard of Sidharth but not seen any of his work. The minute I knew I was doing this project, I googled him and thus became aware of his popularity. However, even though there were ample videos online for me to check out his work, I refrained," Priyanka tells IANS.

Priyanka, who earlier worked as assistant director in the popular series "Aarya", reveals the reason. "I didn't want to be tainted with a preconceived image of Sidharth while we were drafting the story and building Agastya (the character Sidharth plays in the series). I was hoping he would come and pleasantly surprise me with his own interpretation of Agastya. My hope turned to trust the first time we met for his narration," she says.

"The best part is he was so grounded. He had zero airs of a star and we immediately hit off a comfort level where we understood each other's interpretation of the story and the character, and were in fact on the same page regarding vision and the aesthetics," she says.