Exclusive interview with Ed Robinson Australian Actor Writer and Producer

By Jean-Paul Eliard
The 04 February 2025

 

Hi Ed, I'm glad to do this interview


Can you introduce yourself to the visitors of cinema-movietheater.com?

Yeah sure, I’m Ed Robinson and in Freedom at Midnight I play a character called George Abell who serves as the sort of righthand-man to the Viceroy Mountbatten.

As an actor I work mostly in Hindi film and TV but before I arrived in India I was working for a few years in North America, occasionally on-camera but primarily as a voice over actor.

 

What did you like in your character of George Abell and in the script when you read it?

Well before I read the script I read the book.

Freedom at Midnight the TV series was adapted from a book by Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins.

I was told the production was coming up and I started reading the book before I actually knew which (if any) role I’d be playing.

George Abell was a very accomplished man, right before the events of FAM took place he was made a Knight Commander of the Indian Empire, and he was also an accomplished cricketer.

One of the things that I liked about the character was that he was an Englishman who had allowed himself to be “Indianised”- for want of a better word. He spoke Hindi and Punjabi, was well versed in Indian history and served under two consecutive Viceroys as Private Secretary,  as well as beforehand serving as Private Secretary to the Governor of Punjab.

Where a lot of Englishmen of the time existed as aliens in their postings within India, he was someone who went the other way and really localised himself over the 20 years he spent in the country.

As, myself, being someone who lives in India as a foreigner and has done for several years now, there was a lot I could appreciate and admire in that.

Photo Credit : Ed Robinson

How did you prepare for your role? Did you read newspapers, watched actuality of this time?

Well like a lot of Civil Servants of the time, Abell was someone who laboured in relative obscurity. Despite his impact there’s not a great deal on record about him or his life.
I was only able to find a handful of photos of him.

In terms of preparation as an actor, I’m Australian so naturally I speak with an Australian accent and for this role I was performing as an Englishman.
There was one point where I was talking with the series director Nikkhil Advani about the accent to use and I went through a roster of varieties- England has
so many accents to choose from, and after about the third or fourth one he just said “Yes! That one, that’s the one.” and that was the voice I went with.
There was no historical footage of his voice or mannerisms unfortunately so it was all just a presumptive performance. 

 

How did you get this role?

Well, for a start it’s probably worth noting there are not a ton of white guys in the Indian film industry, so I have a bit of a leg up based on rarity.
Add onto that the ability to speak Hindi (though I freely acknowledge my Hindi is far from fluent) and you’re only in a class with about ten or so other guys.

Owing to this, I had been cast in 2022 or 23 in a show called Rocket Boys on which I worked with Nikkhil Advani for the first time, playing a somewhat similar role as the second in command to the CIA director.
Apparently I had made enough of an impression that by the time FAM went in to casting my name was put forward for this role and I went in to read with Nikkhil’s co-director Revanta Sarabhai- who is an amazingly creative guy and super generous in his feedback and insights. After that I was pretty well locked.

How is the shooting with Sidhant Gupta, Chirag Vohra, Rajendra Chawla .......... and the director Nikkhil Advani?

 All great actors, and it was often quite wonderful to be working with them and feel as though you truly were standing face to face with Jinnah, Nehru, Gandhi. There were also a number of wonderfully gifted women I was able to act alongside- Cordelia Bugeja, Ira Dubey, RJ Malishka who brought so much to the series as a whole.
Cordelia in particular knew exactly who her interpretation of Lady Mountbatten was and occupied that character with an amazing level of life and depth.

It was always funny and a bit surreal being off-set with these people talking as naturally as anything and then suddenly seeing an entirely different person once the cameras rolled.
Arif in particular as Jinnah became so intimidating as a figure during each scene and then flip! He was back to being as jovial as anything.

Nikkhil is a very clever director who is able to hold an immense amount in his head, you really do believe he can see the whole series at every stage, like if he sat down and closed his eyes I’m sure during production he could have watched each episode mentally and known exactly how it would turn out.

 

Where is the TV series shot and when?

It was shot about 90% in India. For my scenes I shot in Mumbai, Patiala, Jodhpur, Jaipur, and then briefly in Poland for some of the interiors. 
It was shot from Feb to about October of 2023 and there’s a little bit more filming to do for Season 2 coming up in early March.

 

When and why did you choose to be an actor? 

I initially started out as a TV Writer which was something I was far more interested in at the time.

The problem I found was that in each production there’s only ever one or two writers and potentially dozens and dozens of actors so the opportunities are much more available to actors.

I do still love writing and I keep a toe in it, most recently writing a feature for the Hallmark Channel. For the most part, day-to-day I work as a voice over actor, voicing a ton of adverts, cartoon characters, video games, instructional videos that sort of thing.

While a lot of them are quite small I’ve managed to rack up about 500 or so VO credits. That is still very much my blue-collar, bread and butter work that keeps the lights on, and then I will occasionally pop up onscreen in something like FAM.

Credit where it’s due to my agents at DYT here in Mumbai who’ve been really good to me and have provided a lot of opportunities in the on-camera demesne.

 

what is your next challenge / project?
My next project is actually working with Nikkhil Advani once again on his new series for Amazon Prime.

The details are a little under wraps at the moment, but I can say it’s a period drama taking place around 1910’s British India.

I’ll start filming that in mid March of this year.

My next project releasing is an Amazon series called Bhay- The Gaurav Tiwari Mystery, and after that a Netflix series called Mandala Murders.

The funny thing about shooting in India is sometimes the times between shooting things and their release is a good bit longer than the rest of the world, so it’s always nice to see something pop up that you shot two plus years ago and think “oh yeah, that one!”

 

Do you wish to add something ?
If you’re someone who doesn’t watch much or any Indian TV programming

I’d say it’s changed a lot in the last decade.

Outside of India, Indian programming is probably most often thought of as the hyper melodramatic soap operas, but recently premium content has been really strong coming out of India- shows like Sacred Games, Delhi Crimes, Rocket Boys, Kota Factory and dozens more, all worth checking out, don’t let the subtitles turn you off.


Thank you very much for your interview  Ed I wish you all the best


More information about  Ed on IMDb

My Critic :
I taked a subscription on Sony Liv to see the Hockey India League.
But I love history too and I saw this serie on the independence of India with subtitle in English. I watched Freedom at Midnight and it is an excellent serie. With of actrors and actresses who are excellent in their role.


My mark :
10 / 10

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