Playing roles related to historical events is always challenging for actors. Since people know about those roles, some people have even seen them, the actor has to live up to everyone’s expectations. Actor Arif Zakaria has played the role of Muslim League President and Pakistan’s first Governor General Mohammad Ali Jinnah in the web series Freedom at Midnight. Talking about his role in this show, which is being released on Sony Liv on November 15, Arif says, ‘When the ideals and personality of your character do not match you, then only it becomes challenging. Jinnah was a lawyer in Bombay (now Mumbai), lived among rich people and was very influenced by the British. There was an arrogance in his nature, even when he spoke, it was as if he was giving orders. I had to work a little to show all this in my role. It was difficult for me to bring that arrogance, because I do not have much ego. Jinnah had cancer, for that I had to become very thin, had to lose some of my weight.’ Further, Arif says about the incident of partition of the country that I look at the incident of partition of India and Pakistan from the point of view of a historian. The incident in which so many people died, lives were lost, that incident was undoubtedly wrong.
