The remuneration of movie stars need to be looked at again and many of them are not in touch with reality, filmmaker Karan Johar said on Wednesday as he weighed in on the debate around the rising star fee in Bollywood.

“The main remuneration of the actors has to be looked at again. It’s very critical for all the actors to understand exactly how the times are, how the climate of our movies are, and how difficult it is to maneuver through making a massive motion picture or a motion picture of any magnitude,” Karan said at an event in Mumbai.

He added, “Every single movie star has to review what they are asking for, because many a times, there will be certain producers that will pay that money because they want to make that film, but it will eventually cause a lot of damage to the entire system and the ecosystem. The real issue is the cost. So they have to look at that and say that there can be backend deals or there can be percentages of profit. But every actor has to look within, because a lot of them are not really in touch with reality.”

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As many big-budget Bollywood films fail at the box office, Karan Johar feels actors should charge fees based on production costs and profits.

The debate around exorbitant star fees and their entourage costs, including makeup artists, hairdressers along with other crew members, has been on the minds of many filmmakers, including Karan Johar. He feels that it isn’t necessarily the entourage cost but the rising fees of stars which isn’t “viable” and is negatively affecting a film’s budget.

“The entourage cost is the least of our worries. It’s the main remuneration of the actors that needs to be looked into. It’s very critical for all the actors to understand the difficulties that one encounters while making a motion picture of any magnitude or size,” the 52-year-old filmmaker said at an event in Mumbai on Wednesday.

For Johar, the filmmakers can meet the actors’ demands only when the latter comes to understand the reality of profit margins: “They (actors) can take all the entourage they want, that is not the problem. But this can be made possible after the [calculation of] percentages of profits and slabs of the box office as per performance-based remuneration. So, every actor has to look within because a lot of them are not really in touch with reality.”

Talking about additional production costs, he shared, “There are so many costs including the PnA (publicity and advertising) and above-the-line costs. So, every single movie star today has to review what they’re asking for.”

Johar feels that producers would do anything “just to realize their film” including adhering to rising fees of stars that can potentially “damage the entire system”.

Meanwhile, he also filed a suit against the makers of the Shaadi Ke Director Karan Aur Johar, an upcoming film, for violating his personal rights at Bombay High Court. “By using the brand name of Plaintiff in the title of the said Film, the Defendants are creating confusion in the minds of the public at large that the said Film is associated with Plaintiff (sic),” his plaint reads. HTC

Johar, who’s had a long-running spat with Kangana Ranaut, condemned the CISF personnel slapping the actor-MP in Chandigarh. “Dekhiye, I don’t support or condone any form of violence,” said Johar, whose feud with Ranaut began in 2017 when she labelled the filmmaker as the “torchbearer of nepotism” on his talk show.