Charlie Hunnam on his new Apple show ‘Shantaram’ and how he ‘went through a period of bad luck’

nypost.com:

Apple TV+ series “Shantaram.” “I love longform storytelling, and when I finished ‘Sons of Anarchy’ I knew at some point that I wanted to get into another television show,” Hunnam, 42, told The Post.

Hunnam starred as swaggering biker Jax Teller on “Sons of Anarchy” (2008-2014). Since then, he’s focused on the big screen in movies including “The Lost City of Z,” “The Gentlemen,” “King Arthur: Legend of the Sword” and “Triple Frontier.” “I think it was probably about three years after ‘Sons’ finished that I was given this book [that ‘Shantaram’ is based on],” he said. “And it truly has been sort of an obsession, and a burning desire to be part of this team.” Premiering Oct.

14, “Shantaram” is based on a novel by Australian former heroin addict and convicted bank robber Gregory David Roberts. The plot follows Lin Ford (Hunnam), a fugitive from prison who escapes to the vibrant world of 1980s Bombay.

There, as a stranger in a strange land, he tries to create a new life for himself and avoid trouble.The show was filmed in India and Thailand, and Hunnam said that, while he spent time in the former country to get a feel for the “magic and beauty of the place,” it wasn’t a walk in the park.“I went through a period of bad luck where I contracted a very severe respiratory infection, a bacterial gut infection and a viral [infection],” he said. “I had an ear infection, conjunctivitis in both eyes, and then got a mosquito bite and contracted dengue fever.