Taapsee Pannu said that despite the OTT boom, the industry still tends to favour stars, which further widens the gap between actors and stars.
Taapsee Pannu is back with her second production venture ‘Dhak Dhak’, which hit the screens today on October 13. Starring Ratna Pathak Shah, Dia Mirza, Fatima Sana Shaikh and Sanjana Sanghi in the lead roles, the film revolves around four female bikers who go on a bike trip to finally come to understand that freedom is something to be claimed, not granted.
Now in a recent interview with ETimes, Taapsee mentioned how as an actor-producer, despite the OTT boom, the Indian showbiz industry tends to favour stars, thereby bridging the gap between real talent and massive stars.
Recalling how after Dhak Dhak’s trailer, she got comments that since it has a female-centric theme, it would likely attract only niche audiences and get fewer screenings, Taapsee stated how some people even mentioned how promoting such a film in theatres was unnecessary as they would rather watch it on OTT.
Reiterating that her film is not as big as Shah Rukh Khan-starrer Jawan, Taapsee said that there has to be an adequate push for smaller films as well, and not just give prevalence to star-centric projects. The actress even mentioned that her belief in content being the king has now broken post the production of Dhak Dhak as people only prioritise lead actors over fully understanding the story.
“This myth I had about people believing in ‘content is king’ was shattered while making this (Dhak Dhak ) film. There’s so much hypocrisy. They will hear your one-line story and will be quick to ask, “Picture mein actor kaun hai (Who is the hero in the film)?” That decides their financial and emotional investment in the project,” she was quoted as saying.
She held actors, studios and audiences equally accountable, and said, “We keep saying Bollywood doesn’t attempt something meaningful but when we try to do that, there’s rarely any support and this must change.”
Previously, Taapsee backed ‘Blurr’ on Zee 5.