Ed Sheeran Talks Acting Ambitions with Kapil Sharma

Ed Sheeran leans into his Indophile reputation as a guest on an upcoming The Great Indian Kapil Show episode, set to air on Netflix on May 18th.

The British pop star behind hits like “Shape Of You,” “Perfect” and “Bad Habits” appeared on the show with one of India’s top comedians and actors, Kapil Sharma, around the time of Sheeran’s Mumbai concert on March 16th. The show was part of the artist’s + – = ÷ x Mathematics Tour, which reportedly drew over 50,000 attendees.

On Netflix’s The Great Indian Kapil Show, Sheeran appears on the eighth episode of the 13-episode season. From performing the desi version of “Shape Of You” to playing along with the antics of the show’s cast – Sharma, Sunil Grover, Krushna Abhishek and Archana Puran Singh among others – there were plenty of gags and laughs.

Among the things that Sheeran and Sharma spoke about were their respective journeys in music, acting and entertainment. Sheeran spoke about how he became a singer even when his interest laid elsewhere at the start of his career. “I originally wanted to be an actor. I auditioned for this TV show—it was acting with music—and I made it to the finals. I was 16 and I got down to the final 10 people. In my head, I thought if I get this, I will pursue acting and won’t do music. If I don’t get this, I’ll focus solely on music. And I didn’t get it,” Sheeran said on The Great Indian Kapil Show.

Sharma, for his part, said there was a similarity between them. “Actually, I wanted to become a singer. When I came out of my home, I saw everyone singing. So I swapped my field,” Sharma added.

Sheeran has of course appeared as himself in a few movies, notably filmmaker Danny Boyle’s Beatles-inspired Yesterday in 2019, but also playing characters in T.V. shows like Modern Love (2019), The Simpsons in 2018 and Game of Thrones in 2017, among others.

At other points of the show, as seen in trailers, Sheeran is part of a sketch with Grover in character, pitching that the British play a show in Rajasthan. He might laugh that off, but Sheeran does string together a few Rajasthani song lines for entertainment value. In another segment, Sharma even asks Sheeran about meeting Shah Rukh Khan, for which the artist brings out a Hindi dialogue from SRK’s Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge – “Bade bade shehron mein aisi choti choti baatein hoti rehti.”

If Sheeran has shown his love for India in the past with Bollywood parties and a smattering of Hindi dialogues, he dived further into entertainment circles on this visit. From meetings with top Bollywood acting stars like Shah Rukh Khan and Indian musicians like Armaan Malik (the pair performed together at Sheeran’s gig), DIVINE and King, among others.

In a previous Netflix video, Sheeran said about being part of The Great Indian Kapil Show, “I loved being on Kapil’s show. I’ve heard a lot about it. And I’m honored to be a guest on it. It’s much more crazier in person and it’s fun. And yeah, it’s been fun, learning Hindi for the first time, singing with them and the band too.”