Shekhar Kapur reveals how producers 'fancy themselves as directors'; Hansal Mehta agrees

After filmmaker Sudhir Mishra tweeted praising the 'sheer skill' of Shekhar Kapur as a director, the Bandit Queen director opened up about how several producers fancy themselves as directors. Without naming the producer, Shekar shared a personal experience wherein the producer asked him to behave like a director, which he revealed, was to scream and shout on the sets. Soon, filmmaker Hansal Mehta joined the bandwagon and shared his personal experience too, followed by the Badhai Ho actor Gajraj Rao joining in the conversation to express how grateful he is of Kapur. 

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Shekhar Kapur says, 'I don't dare enact a scene for an actor'

On August 7, Shekhar Kapur replied to Sudhir Mishra's tweet, wherein he lauded Kapur's directorial abilities, and wrote, "Unfortunately many producers fancy themselves as directors. Interesting incident? In one of the films I did, the producers complained I was not behaving like a director. I asked how a director behaved? His response? ‘ A Director scream and shouts on set’". Later, his filmmaker friend and the Simran director Hansal Mehta replied to Kapur's tweet and shared how one of the producers of his film expected him to enact the scenes for his actors. 

Soon, this developed into a Twitter conversation between the filmmakers after Kapur replied to Mehta's tweet and revealed writing, "I don’t dare enact a scene for an actor. For fear they might copy me. And that would be a disaster!". In his response, the Omerta director pointed out how a director 'creates an environment for the actor to interpret the character best and help the actor be in that moment'.

Later, Shekhar agreed with his director friend about creating a 'cocoon', within which, the actors can 'explore themselves through the character fearlessly'. Furthermore, Mehta also revealed that he had no money for 'video assist' during his early films so he used to always be near the camera to observe his actors and feel their space. 

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Check out their tweets below:

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Later, the Shubh Mangal Zyaada Saavdhan actor Gajraj Rao joined the filmmakers' Twitter conversation and agreed with Shekhar Kapur by sharing an anecdote from the good old Bandit Queen shoot days. Rao also thanked Kapur for easing him into the whole shooting experience and giving him confidence when he was a 'nervous and scrawny youngster'.

Later, an intrigued Hansal Mehta proposed the idea of a live session with a couple of directors to Shekhar Kapur and Sudhir Mishra and received a thumbs up from The Four Feathers director.

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