Bharati Dubey (MID-DAY; July 11, 2014)

It has emerged that Vikas Sivaraman, cinematographer of Bang Bang, has gone on medical leave. As a result, the last schedule of the film will be shot by Sunil Patel, who earlier worked with Siddharth Anand on his film, Salaam Namaste (2005). But sources say that Vikas left the project because of stunt consultant Andy Armstrong’s highhanded behaviour. It seems that Andy was rude to the crew during an outdoor shoot in Abu Dhabi and this didn’t go down well with Vikas, who decided to leave the project.

When contacted, Vikas denied the story. He said, “I have a cyst and it was quite painful, so I took a break from the film’s shoot. Sunil Patel, who has worked with Siddharth earlier, is completing the film. And no, I never had a problem with Siddharth. But I did not like the behaviour of stunt consultant Andy Armstrong, who was rude to the entire crew. He behaved very badly with the unit.’’

But Vijay Singh of Fox Star Studios says, “These are baseless allegations. Andy has done a fabulous job and the breathtaking action sequences that we will see in in the film are a testimony to the work that he put in. Yes, Vikas needed to have an urgent operation and could not continue with the project.”