Rohit Shetty takes responsibility for Cirkus failure, says it didn’t hurt him: ‘If Sooryavanshi is mine, so is Cirkus’

Filmmaker Rohit Shetty has taken responsibility for poor performance of his previous films, Cirkus and Dilwale. While Cirkus starred Ranveer Singh, Dilwale saw Shah Rukh Khan in the lead role.

By: Entertainment Desk

Chennai | July 17, 2023 07:20 PM IST

3 min read

Cirkus was directed by Rohit Shetty. It starred Ranveer Singh and Varun Sharma. (Pic: Rohit/Instagram)

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Director and producer Rohit Shetty recently opened up about the failure of his last film, Cirkus, starring Ranveer Singh. Despite high expectations from the audience, the movie tanked at the box office and faced criticism from both audience and critics. In a candid interview with Bollywood Bubble, Rohit admitted full responsibility for the film’s outcome and shared how actor Anupam Kher’s advice helped him gain clarity.

When asked if Cirkus’ failure hurt him, Rohit responded, “It didn’t hurt me. I am not the kind of person who gets hurt, you get disappointed when you work hard on a thing and it does not work, but you analyse and you move forward. You can’t be an escapist. If I made Sooryavanshi, then I also made Cirkus. If Chennai Express is my film, then Dilwale is also mine. Dilwale didn’t do as much business as Chennai Express did but that is meant to happen.”

Also read | Rohit Shetty reveals why he is strict on Khatron Ke Khiladi: ‘I like to keep it real’

He continued, “The best part is that you can’t deny it. You can’t make excuses that it didn’t work because of this or that. Somewhere you had gone wrong and if you, as a man, say this, analyse this and sit with your team, they also admit that we all went wrong somewhere, let’s move forward and get into the next project. I think that’s life. Ups and downs are a part of life, you learn from your failure and never be an escapist. So, if Sooryavanshi was my film, which was released a year before we opened the theatres and it was the biggest hit with just 50 per cent seating capacity, then with everything going right, the audience is coming to the theatres, and we give a film (Cirkus) that doesn’t do well, that also belongs to me and I will not deny that.”

Rohit, who called Anupam Kher a family friend in the interview, recalled a valuable piece of advice the veteran actor gave him. He said, “Anupam Kher told me something that his father had shared with him, he said, ‘Remember events fail, people don’t. If you are working hard there will be a lot of events in your life to be successful.’ It’s a lesson.”

Currently, Rohit Shetty can be seen as the host of the TV reality show Fear Factor: Khatron Ke Khiladi 13, which premiered on July 15. The show is being filmed in South Africa.

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