Ishaan Khatter is ready to be Internet’s boyfriend

It takes exactly four minutes sitting across Ishaan Khatter for me to call him douche-y. It’s a joke; a dig at his complaining about “getting sick of the seafood on Cape Cod”. 

“And your diamond shoes, also too tight?” 

It’s a risk. He’s young, Hollywood-kissed, in the thick of attention from every demographic on the Kinsey scale, and has film-industry blue blood running through his veins. The Perfect Couple is a hit; #1 on Netflix’s Top Ten (and I’m part of what put it there, having devoured the series in a day). The show has all the fixings of gorgeable TV; murder, intrigue, a great cast and hot people—and Khatter is simultaneously categories three and four. An actor like that could be too serious for even a well-intentioned ribbing to land.

Thankfully, he is not.

Ishaan laughs, nearly pushing up the sleeve of his fitted, black crew neck—and then deciding against it. “Ugh, that really sounds like ‘first world problems,’ right? But Indian food is Indian food, ya. After a point, you need your desi khaana.” 

He’s a bit of a gypsy, he says; an attempt at clarifying that he’s not your average butter-paneer-craving normie. “I don’t get homesick.” But four months of being sequestered on an island, filming his new hit miniseries, disavowed him of that notion. “It was really locked in, watertight. They wanted us there all the time. So I never flew back, and there wasn’t much to do,” he shrugs. “I really did miss India.” 

I acquiesce. I tell him I, too, have been travelling for five months, and jonesing for Lays Magic Masala. It is not the last thing I will have in common with Ishaan Khatter.

He comes from pedigree, but is quick to assert that even Bollywood privilege has a gradient. When I ask why he chose not to tear through a big, Bhansali-sized banner for his debut seven years ago, he smirks. “I’m often asked about my unconventional start with [Majid] Majidi, but let me be clear—it’s not like Sanjay Leela Bhansali was waiting to launch me.” 

Working actor energy emanates off him as he tells me about having to audition for parts in the West, including The Perfect Couple. In fact, he attributes the Westward lean to his agent, whose name he tells me and then rescinds. “Let’s not name him, he’s shy. But he reached out to me when he saw Beyond The Clouds, and had a vision for me. He was very persistent that I work in the West.” A world that has no room for ego, only for stellar auditions. “I got The Perfect Couple with a self-tape. It was a meaty part, one I really wanted to go after. In the books, the character is Caucasian—the Shooter Dival you see on screen was Susanne’s [Bier, the show’s director] interpretation of it.”  

He chuckles when he remembers getting his tape in on the day of deadline. “I had no one to run lines with! All my friends ghosted me. But I played off my own voice on a voice memo; and it landed me the part. I think I’ll just do that from now on,” he laughs. “Funny story.” he adds. “My cameo in Don’t Look Up? That’s actually my audition tape! You can even see my phone charger in the background.”

Vintage vest from The Contemporary Wardrobe Collection

Ishaan is free with his smile, laughing at himself constantly; a tactic I’ve seen celebrities use in the past to come off ‘just like us’. But something tells me that ‘relatable guy’ isn’t a character he’s playing. You really could just have a beer with him. Except he doesn’t drink. 

“Or smoke. I’m a teetotaller. I get my dopamine and serotonin from dance.”

Dance comes up often in our conversation. It is pivotal to his sense of self, he says. “My mother is an incredible dancer. And all of my physical self-expression comes from dance. It’s also where I get my lack of inhibition when I’m doing scenes with actors of stature, like Tabu, that would intimidate the hell out of anyone.” Or when he’s doing sweat-soaked, artistically black and white shoots for a magazine that launched a thousand thirsty comments “And counting,” he jokes. 

People are unhinged in the comments. “Clearly there is no demographic that will kick you out of bed,” I point out. With that, I warn him I will now be going to some thirsty places in this interview. His smile is fittingly bashful for someone of khaandaan. 

“I’m happy to be objectified. But honestly for me it’s—” he stops himself, grinning. “God, you’re going to hate this answer.”

“Go on, give me some stock answer about how it’s all about your craft,” I needle. 

“But I am working on my craft, man. I swear, I know that’s the most fucking conceited answer of all time. I’ve become that guy.” He laughs. “Honestly, though, it’s really nice to be appreciated; but it’s always been the women behind the camera that have made it happen. In A Suitable Boy, Mira di [Nair] wanted Maan to be kind of mercurial and irreverent, but also sexy. In The Perfect Couple, Shooter is meant to be this attractive young guy who comes and stirs things up—not just this object of desire for Amelia. In the books, he’s different—this was Susanne’s vision for him. Sometimes, for a scene, she’d just be like ‘Take the sleeves off his t-shirt, and I was like ‘Okayyy...” he laughs. 

“Take the whole shirt off!” I joke. “But, seriously, Shooter is a sexy character. More of a ‘quiet’ sexy though, a contrast to the ‘loud’ sex appeal of the Christian Greys or the Don Drapers of the world.”

“I’m going to pretend I know who you’re talking about,” he chuckles. I take a moment to insist he watch Mad Men and reassure him he’s missed nothing with Fifty Shades Of Grey before I return to my question: “Shooter—there’s a kindness to him that was lacking in the classic ‘hot guy’, don’t you think?”

“Kindness is an interesting word—and yes. He’s definitely somebody that I read as a bit of an empath. It helped me relate to him because otherwise, I don’t have much in common with Shooter. Losing his mother early, feeling like an outsider, reaching for his personality outside of his world—I think that’s what makes him kinder. He’s very protective of Amelia.” 

Protective, and yet somehow not possessive.  

“Exactly,” he agrees. “It was also interesting to see people seeing me differently, saying ‘You look like a young man now. Apparently, I used to look like a little kid. I had a ‘child-like energy’,” he says, with a boyish grin. “But it bodes well that people think he was attractive. The character doesn’t work if they don’t.”

“So ultimately it was all about your craft,” I grin. “Not your abs. God forbid.” 

“Well, okay, also my abs,” he concedes. “But I’ve always worked on my body—it wasn’t about this role. A lot of things route through dance and training for me. It’s liberating, a mental clutter-clearer. It’s why I enjoy it so much.”

Anderson & Sheppard shirt; Sunspel boxers; Pantherella socks

Interesting, then, that he didn’t want to do the viral opening sequence dance, set to Meghan Trainor’s ‘Criminals’, rumoured to have been choreographed by Taylor Swift’s backup dancers. “No, no, no,” There are six more ‘nos’ in succession. “NONE of that is true. First, it was Dua Lipa’s choreographer, Charm La’Donna, who choreographed it. And secondly, no one wanted to do it. We all just got an email from Susanne on Christmas morning saying ‘Merry Christmas! Learn this dance in a week, please!” My god, our WhatsApp group just blew up.” He is nonchalant about being on a WhatsApp Group with Nicole Kidman and Liev Schrieber, of course. “It was originally meant to be a TikTok dance dream sequence that devolves into a nightmare. But we all thought it was campy... It felt like a sangeet!”

“It really was giving white Sangeet,” I say, and he enthusiastically agrees. But then he admits, “It turned out to be a clever choice, because it set the tone for the series. It took the mickey out of itself. It was the last thing we shot—and ended up being so much fun.” He insists that there is more to the dance than we see in the finale. “Susanne dances with us! They should really release the whole thing. I love that about dance; it gets people out of their heads.” 

Both dance and music have always done that for him, gotten him out of his head—and into his character. “I was a bit of a geek in high school. I watched some DragonBall Z and Courage The Cowardly Dog, and I grew up with YouTube, so I’d occasionally Google videos about dance and parkour (he stops to say ‘Parkour!’, as one should). But mostly, I devoured films and music. I spent part of my first paycheck, from Beyond the Clouds, on a speaker. And, before that, I would play music on my phone in the dressing room. In my head, every character has a playlist.” 

Both were so deeply steeped in him that he wasn’t even sure when acting crept up on him, when he really ‘chose’ it as a serious profession. “I had the chance to be an AD (Assistant Director), I did an intensive course as a dancer, I spent three years as a film festival delegate, being the audience. I would devour films, consume them—sometimes six a day. I was a glutton for them.” 

Did high-school Ishaan think he’d have a six-pack one day? Or is it eight?

“Did I have an eight-pack in high school?” he laughs, beet-red.

“No, did you think you’d have one. If you had one, that would be ridiculous.” 

He sidesteps. “As an actor now, I’m always attune to the physicality of my character. The body language, which is more than just the physique, but it always helps to have control over your instrument.”

Louis Vuitton jeans; vest from The Contemporary Wardrobe Collection

We stare at each other for a second before we laugh.  

“Oh god, that sounded really pretentious. Such a bloody ‘actor’ answer,” he shakes his head. “But really, I just want to do roles that challenge me. I was a geeky kid, watching Marlon Brando and Dilip Kumar films and wanting to do something truly original, raw. It’s why I’d never really want to recreate anything or play a beloved character, like…” 

“Luke Skywalker?” I offer helpfully. I have never seen Star Wars, but I hear he’s important. 

“I’ve never seen Star Wars,” he confesses, and wins ten points.

“But yeah. I wouldn’t really want to fill in an iconic role. I’d rather be the first to do something.” 

And he is. Ishaan represents a new phase for the South Asian actor on the world stage—one that isn’t the diversity hire or locked in by a race-specific part. A phase that comes with being an actor first and star second, willing to check one’s ego at the door for the chance to do great work. A phase that will truly crack open cinema across the world for the actor who truly loves to act. 

Watch Ishaan Khatter prank call his nearest and dearest in our new 'Speed Dial' series, below. 

Hair by Maarit Niemela/Agency 41. Make-up by Jinny Kim. Creative Production by TIAGI

1st Assistant/Gaffer: Gary Sobczyk. 2nd Assistant: Harvey Horne. Digi Op: Harry Burner. Sound Recordist: Oliver Beard. Styling Assistant: Ella McKiernan. Executive Producer: Chantelle-Shakila Tiagi. Production Coordinator: Zim Uddin. Production Assistant: Iman Drissia Coudoux. Runner: Tyler Jade Fowler. Stills Post Production: Adam Reinbach