Entertainment

Did You Know? A leading actress refused to work with the late Sushant Singh Rajput calling him a ‘TV Actor’!

Sushant Singh Rajput began his career in the entertainment industry as a background dancer and starred in two TV serials, ‘Kis Desh Mein Hai Meraa Dil‘ and ‘Pavitra Rishta’, before making his Bollywood debut in ‘Kai Po Che!’ in 2013. The latter turned out to be his big break, opening doors for him in the Hindi film industry.

Prior to the release of his debut film, Sushant was scheduled to star in the 2014 romantic comedy Hasee Toh Phasee, which was produced by Karan Johar and Anurag Kashyap. However, Parineeti Chopra, who played the lead in the movie, refused to share screen time with Sushant, referring to him as a ‘television actor.‘ Afterwards, she suggested Sushant’s name to Aditya Chopra for the ‘Shuddh Desi Romance’ romantic comedy in 2013. After leaving ‘Hasee Toh Phasee’, the late actor signed a three-film deal with Yash Raj Films.

Anurag Kashyap gets candid on Sushant Singh Rajput:

In 2020, Anurag Kashyap discussed the entire incident during his interview with journalist Faye D’Souza. He confessed, “He was supposed to do the film (Hasee Toh Phasee), and we had to find an actress, so we contacted Parineeti Chopra. ‘I don’t want to work with a television actor’ the woman declared. We thus gave her an explanation of Sushant Singh’s identity, the fact that he is working on ‘Kai Po Che’ and ‘PK’, and the fact that by the time ‘Hasee Toh Phasee’ is released, he will be more than just a TV actor.”

He further added, “She was working on a movie called ‘Shuddh Desi Romance’ when she must have gone to YRF. They called him and suggested that he come work on ‘Shuddh Desi Romance’ rather than that movie. And he vanished in front of us.”

In ‘Haseee Toh Phasee’, Sidharth Malhotra took Sushant’s place. The box office results for ‘Haseee Toh Phasee’ and ‘Shuddh Desi Romance’, which also featured Vaani Kapoor, were both positive. ‘Detective Byomkesh Bakshy!’ was Sushant’s second film with YRF, released in 2015. His third movie with the production company, Paani, was cancelled because director Shekhar Kapur and head of YRF Aditya Chopra couldn’t agree on creative terms.