Arjun Kapoor reveals he rejected Kabir Singh for Shahid Kapoor to avoid ego clash

Despite facing massive backlash from the critics, director Sandeep Reddy Vanga's Kabir Singh, which was a remake of his blockbuster Telugu film Arjun Reddy, went on to become one of the highest grossing movies in Bollywood. It had collected over Rs 275 crore during its lifetime and Shahid Kapoor was hailed for pulling off such a complex and damaged character like Kabir Singh on screen. While Shahid had always been Sandeep's first choice to play Kabir Singh, Arjun Kapoor has now revealed that he had backed out of the film to avoid ego clash.

Unfolding things about how it happened, Arjun said that the producers, Murad Khetani and Ashwin Varde, who had produced Mubarakan, had acquired the remake rights of Arjun Reddy. And while the producers were keen to cast Arjun for the role of Kabir Singh, the director had already locked Shahid for the part.

"Sandeep Vanga, the director had met Shahid and he had seen the film before and they decided to do the film together," Arjun said at the 10th Jagran Film Festival in Mumbai.

He further added, "The film needed Sandeep Vanga. There is a madness to that film, there is an inherent energy. It is a simple story but there was madness to the treatment. He (Sandeep) had already committed and he wanted to stick by his words and I respect that. I did not want my producers sitting around with the rights of the film and not making it out of me being in an ego tussle with anybody."

He continued, "It doesn't mean I left it or I did not choose it. It is complicated. There are human emotions and decisions and lot of things come into picture. The director wanted somebody else because he and committed to someone it was not that he said, you can't do it. My impulse stays right as I selected the right material but then you move on in life."

Kabir Singh had been at the receiving end of harsh criticism from film reviewers ever since the movie was released in theatres. Film reviewers blasted out at Kabir Singh calling it misogynist and a full show of acts of toxic masculinity. There were hardly any reviews of Kabir Singh which talked about its brilliant onscreen performances - lead and supporting cast, screenplay, dialogues, comic timing and music. But Kabir Singh braved it all.