Sanjay Leela Bhansali Says Actors 'Hijack' Credit For Good Performance, Should 'Realise I'm Not The Star'

Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Heeramandi: The Diamond Bazaar has been the talk of the town since its release. Bhansali is one of the most prolific directors in Bollywood and is known for harnessing brilliant performances from his actors, which they themselves don’t always know that they are capable of. In a recent chat, Bhansali said that a good performance is not to the actor’s credit alone but also to the technicians involved behind the camera.

“A performance does not belong to an actor. A good performance belongs to a director, dialogue writer, cinematographer, art director, costume designer, choreographer, editor, and the guy who has painted the wall behind you. You are saying ‘my performance’, but you are never saying that these people are responsible for my performance. Everything is suddenly hijacked by the actor, which is where the problem in Indian cinema is,” he told Gallata Plus.

Bhansali said that it is important for actors “to realise that I am not the star.” He said, “The star is… everybody collectively comes and makes me a star. Will you please acknowledge and say I did this performance and I had a great dialogue writer, art director, costume guy, and make up person? You will rarely find an actor giving credit to other people for their performance.”

However, Bhansali said that he loves his actors and added, “He/she has to be nurtured, he has to be given all the perks to be able to now go through the grind so I understand that he is also going through the grind.” Having said that, the director mentioned that while actors may feel that filmmakers have given them the freedom to portray certain roles, that is not the case.

“There is a very strange way of me reaching out to them. So, sometimes my actors go to the extent of saying that ‘we were given the freedom and we did this’. No, there is no freedom. There is an illusion of freedom given to you, you are told what to do, sometimes subtly, sometimes obviously,” he said, and added, “Sometimes, the actors should have the freedom to able to express themselves in a certain way but that doesn’t mean that I did this performance, it belongs to me,” he said.

Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Heeramandi was released on Netflix on May 1. Its stars Manisha Koirala, Sonakshi Sinha, Aditi Rao Hydari, Sanjeeda Sheikh, Richa Chadha and Sharmin Segal in the lead.