Of late, Kangana Ranaut has become the most talked about actress in the industry thanks to her arrogance and rude behaviour. Director Krish Jagarlamudi, who was at the receiving end of Kangana's egotism, had recently exposed the actress about how she took over the project and humiliated him and even scissored roles of her co-actors. And now Mishti Chakravarty, who played the role of Kashi Bai in Manikarnika, has blasted Kangana for chopping off her role in the historical period drama.
Mishti expressed her shock after watching the final outcome of Manikarnika and said that she didn't expect her role to be so short in the film.
"This was not what I was expecting. This was not what we shot for. This was not what I was promised. So, if you are talking on a personal level about my thing then I can't really say am happy about it," Mishti Chakravarty told Bollywood Hungama in an interview.
Mishti further revealed that Manikarnika producer Kamal Jain had offered her the role of Kashi Bai saying that "it is a fantastic role and there is a lot to perform". She said she wanted her role to be substantial and was initially hesitant to take up the role in the film.
"What I want to do as an actor is have an adequate scope for performance. It might be just for five minutes. It's not about being a lead or not, it's about the performance. So that's what I was told...my character has some great scenes and a fantastic scope of acting which is at par with the leading lady of the film," Mishti said.
She said that she signed the film because of director Krish as she was keen on working with him considering his body of work in the South film industry adding that "Krish had a different vision for Kashi Bai."
Mishti further revealed that most of her important scenes didn't make it to the final copy which were directed by Krish. She said that she lliterally walked out of the theatres after realising that many scenes including the one which had shot with Kangana didn't make it to the final copy.
"I was literally shocked. This was not what we shot for. This was not what I was expecting. I am an actor and I just don't want my face to be seen. That there are a few nice close ups and that's it. I want my work to be talked about, not my clothes and shoes," Mishti expressed her huge disappointment.
Mishti also refuted Kangana's claim that she directed 70 per cent of the film and said that she must be talking about 'Baahubali type flying action shots'. Setting things very clear, she said that Kangana has fiddled a lot with Manikarnika in the edit to glorify herself. She even went on to compare Kangana's professionalism with Vidya Balan and how Kangana made false promises to her co-actors saying that she was trying to give everybody a prominent space on screen.
"I would go with Krish's version. Kangana modified the movie in the edit. To glorify yourself, you don't need to put others down. If you are great, you will stand out in the crowd. If however, you don't have the confidence in yourself, then you just want it all by yourself. That is how I look at it, I am not judging anyone over here. I am not talking about Kangana or Vidya. But then I have seen Vidya Balan. There may be 10 women around her but she still stands out in the crowd. She never tried to chop off anybody's character. She didn't need to," Mishti said.
She added, "Kangana had said, 'I want dates because all characters look jumbled up. I want to introduce them properly. I have taken nice close ups...I trying my best to give everybody a prominent space on screen.' After watching the movie, there is no scope for other characters. So there was no need to make fake promises."
She further validated Krish's account of completing the shooting of the project before leaving by saying, "When I saw the film, I was really upset about my scenes being removed. After the movie, I didn't even speak to anyone. I just walked out of the theatre. Although, I did see the end credits and I saw Kangana's name before Krish as director. Krish directed this film right from the beginning to almost the end. He deserves to be credited as the director of this film first."