More than a decade ago, Anurag Kashyap and Abhay Deol had united for the pathbreaking Dev D (2009). While the audience wished for another brilliant collaboration between the duo, Deol and Kashyap only grew apart. In the latest edition of Sit with Hitlist (OG A-B of Bollywood Indie 21/01/2023), Deol, who is basking in the success of Netflix’s Trial by Fire, opened up about his falling-out with Kashyap, over the latter’s scathing words in a 2020 interview. The director had called working with the actor “a painfully difficult” experience. He had said that Deol wanted to do artistic movies but also wanted the mainstream benefits—the luxuries of being a “Deol”.

In the recent episode of Sit with Hitlist, Deol reacted to Kashyap’s allegations, saying, “[Kashyap] went in public, and told a lot of lies about me. One was that I demanded a [five-star] hotel room [during the shoot of Dev D]. He had actually come up to me and said, ‘Listen, you can’t stay with us, you are a Deol. So, I want to put you up in a hotel room.’ He literally told me that. What he told the press was that I demanded it.”

When mid-day contacted the Gangs of Wasseypur director, he says he had apologized to Deol once and “is ready to apologize again”. He further says that he understands if the actor felt attacked by his previous comments in the press. “It is okay if that is how he feels. Everyone has his own version of the truth. Maybe he felt attacked about what I had spoken about him earlier. I have personally apologized to him for hurting his feelings,” Kashyap says.

While he is apologetic, the filmmaker also insists that his opinion was based on how the actor was in the past. “What I said was what he was [like] in the past,” he emphasizes. Kashyap added that he doesn’t wish to drag the matter, and instead hopes to celebrate Deol’s latest work. “We all evolve with time. He has done a great job in [Trial By Fire]. I think it is time to celebrate his strong performance rather than playing the ping-pong of who said what.”