A sleeper hit when its first season dropped on Netflix two years ago, Season 2 of Maamla Legal Hai premieres today. Bringing back the heart and humour of its first outing, the comedy-drama, which focuses on the bizarre goings-on at the district court of Patparganj and is peopled with bindaas characters, is led by actor Ravi Kishan (whose Visheshwar D. Tyagi is elevated to principal district judge this season) and is truly led by its talented ensemble cast. t2 chatted with Anant V. Joshi (who plays Vishwas Pandey), Nidhi Bisht (as Sujata Negi aka Sujata Didi) and Kusha Kapila (who essays the role of Nayana Arora) to know more.

How does Season 2 of Maamla Legal Hai build on the pull and popularity of the first season?

Anant V. Joshi: There has definitely been a leap this season. The characters remain fascinating and in keeping with the kind of strange and colourful court cases we have seen in Season 1, there will be more this time around. The characters that the viewers have loved, which includes Vishwas (played by him), Sujata Didi (Nidhi Bisht) and Mintuji (Anjum Batra), have evolved in their personal lives this season. Nayana, played by Kusha (Kapila), brings in a different dynamic. Season 2 has new actors and new characters.
Nidhi Bisht: The response to the first season was overwhelming. That made Netflix champion Season 2 and that was a big motivator for all of us. The writers have put in a little more madness in Season 2 and as actors, we had a lot of fun bringing that to life. I feel this season is better than the first on many counts.
Kusha Kapila: The show has only gone from strength to strength. There is a certain ease in the show which also translates on to the audience when they watch it. Writing-wise, this season takes it up a notch and doesn’t shy away from exploring the emotional bits or the uncomfortable spaces. Along with humour, there is a heartwarming quality to this season.

What makes the world of Maamla Legal Hai so popular?

Anant: The fact that it is so rooted. Nothing is superficial about this world. That is what brings about a strong audience connect. We read about a lot of quirky court cases in newspapers, we hear stories. In Season 1, my character had a line that went: “Reality is stranger than non-fiction” and I think that really sums up the world of Maamla Legal Hai. A lot of strange realities come up through the medium of the cases on this show. I think the audience connects to this reality.
Nidhi: This is a desi, homegrown watch with a sitcom-like quality that instantly appealed to viewers. This is a space that the audience had been craving for long and the show filled that gap. Its typical desi humour also contributes to its popularity. It is a very breezy watch... you won’t even realise that eight episodes have whizzed by. The show’s binge-able quality has been a big strength of Season 1 and the effort is to take that forward this season.
Kusha: The producers and writers of the show have told me that even lawyers have really taken to Maamla Legal Hai. There can be no bigger high to know that the people who the show is about have embraced it so wholeheartedly. That is a solid audience base to have. All the cases on this show come from some element of truth and that is what works, I feel. Its slightly inspired, slightly adapted quality makes it popular.

What do you identify the most in your respective characters and what makes them different from who you are?

Anant: I identify with Vishwas’s roots... he is a typical middle-class launda!
Nidhi: Sujata’s scooty is very relatable... all through my college days, I would drive a scooty every day. How to navigate a bike is something that I have taught my character. A very aspirational quality that Sujata possesses is that she is very bindaas. She is not scared, she is very brave and perhaps a boss-lady of sorts. I think Nidhi needs to borrow that quality from Sujata Didi.
Kusha: Nayana is very competitive and I am someone who can get very competitive, not at work, but on game nights! (Laughs) If someone places a bet with me, I get very competitive. In card games, even if I have my dad playing with me, I get very competitive. Nayana, too, is so competitive that she may just self-combust some day!

What has been the most memorable aspect of making this show across two seasons?

Nidhi: For me, it would be the sequence involving Sujata Didi when it is said: “Didi daleel deti nahin hain, Didi khud daleel hain”. That was done so beautifully, and the production design totally supported that. I would find Sujata pretty strange in the beginning (laughs), but I have grown to understand her now. That was one sequence which was the point at which I had a chance to make Sujata lovable.
Anant: For me, that would be every scene in which the ensemble cast would get together. There would be amazing chemistry and camaraderie, not only on camera but also behind the scenes.
Nidhi: Speaking of the ensemble cast, since most of the actors on the show are from a theatre background, there is an improvisational quality to most of the scenes we did together. It was a lot of fun.
Kusha: I had a lot of fun shooting with Anant and Naila (Grrewal, who plays Ananya Shroff), though I did struggle a bit because we shot in peak summer. We would be sweating buckets and yet had to do scenes which were very timing based. In a scene which I had with the two of them, we had another co-star who had a line which had the word: “Ma’am” and he would only look at Anant at that time instead of the two us, which was really, really funny!

Irrespective of gender, if you had a chance to play any other character apart from your own, who would you pick?

Nidhi: I would say Tyagi (played by Ravi Kishan) because even Sujata’s ambition is to become like Tyagi one day. Sujata now has her sights set on Tyagi’s title of principal district judge.
Kusha: Just for fun, I would like to be the character, played by Nirahua, in Season 2. The character has so much physical comedy to do and it is a lot of fun. It is challenging because you have to ensure that it lands every time, but playing that character would be fun.
Anant: I would love to play Ananya Shroff... a lawyer with so much style and such accented English. No one offers me a role like that! Her comedy is also a level up this season.