- By Vridhi Soodhan
- Fri, 11 Jul 2025 04:18 PM (IST)
- Source:JND
Anurag Kashyap is a phenomenal director with a unique vision of filmmaking. He holds the power of weaving cinematic beauty from classic literature. With movies like Black Friday, based on Hussain Zaidi's book about the 1993 Bombay bombings, Dev D, a modern take on Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay's Devdas and Bombay Velvet, based on Gyan Prakash's Mumbai Fables, Anurag Kashyap has proved his skills to transform the written text into a visual treasure. Recently, the director expressed his disappointment with the OTT giant Netflix for ignoring his hard work on a particular project without any explanation.
Anurag Kashyap spent almost two years bringing Suketu Mehta’s book Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found to life. He handwrote a 900-page script and offered it to Netflix. Anurag envisioned it as a three-part, nine-hour series. However, his hopes were crushed when the OTT platform abruptly cut off communication without giving a final answer to the director. In a recent interview with The Juggernaut, he explained his frustration towards Netflix.
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Talking about his disappointment, he said, “I was working with Suketu and I was researching the book, and I have been wanting to do it ever since 2004. I have adapted it. I have done the adaptation, but it’s stuck. I have been with the book for 21 years. The scripts are done but the project is kind of stalled. I am desperately want to bring it to life. This was the reason why I imploded when it didn’t happen. There’s a reason why I fell sick and everything happened to me. I had invested over one and a half year in Maximum City. I hand write my scripts. I handwrote 900 pages. So when you put so much effort in a project and for other it’s just a matter of… like you can’t evaluate that in money. Somebody just to save their jobs put it aside and ghosts you… it breaks you.”
He called his work ‘an emotional investment’ and stated that Netflix still doesn’t understand what makes him angry about them. The director further called out the OTT platform for not being brave enough to own up to an answer and said, “Somebody’s one and half years of work where you write with your hand was disregarded. It was supposed to be a Netflix project and they ghosted me. They didn’t even have the courage to walk to me and tell that ‘we are having a problem. Can we solve it?’ or even ‘we are not doing it.’ They didn’t have the courage.”
Anurag Kashyap got vocal and expressed his anger towards Netflix. The Gangs Of Wasseypur director pointed out that Netflix is unaware of India’s wants. “I started the debate because they don’t understand India. They do the same kind of shitty stuff. What India office tells them, they believe that bullshit. They are doing exactly what bad television was doing to India. And they are charging money for it. They are not understanding why they are losing value in the country. What makes me angry is they pat their own back for the show that they didn’t have the courage to produce. They acquired it. All good shows on Netflix are acquired,” he said.
