Karni Sena's protests to Sonu Sood walking out: How Kangana Ranaut's Manikarnika battled controversies to stand tall

When the Karni Sena protested over Manikarnika’s release without their approval, Kangana had a reply to give it back to them in their own style. "Four historians have certified Manikarnika, we have got censor certificate as well, Karni Sena has been conveyed this but they are continuing to harass me. If they don't stop then they should know I am also a Rajput and I will destroy each one of them," she said in a statement.

Kangana hinted towards Ketan Mehta's allegations against her and the film's crew and said in the interview, “Yes this film went through problems but saying that this film would be problematic wouldn’t be fair. I had many accidents through this film and one of the major setbacks was also the creative call.”

Talking about the original director Krish’s exit from the project, Kangana clarified, “From how I see this situation, I can say from my perspective. So Krish is a writer-director. He’s never really done any other writer’s film in his career. So when he was working on this, he was very confident that he would like to take it the way he does. We had really loved the script that Vijendra sir had written. In the middle of the shoot as well, in Bikaner, my producer of the film also felt that the requirements of the scene and location are not like what they were in the script. So we discussed it with Vijendra sir, because you can’t really tell. He (Krish) is a great writer-director and he’s very successful but whether it’s good or bad, that you can’t tell so early on but it’s not what we expected.”

She then narrated the tale of how a new director stepped in but refused the project, which is why she stepped in. “The action was shot by Nick Powell and Chris which they were very happy with. The only portion they wanted to reshoot was some patchwork of action and drama - the entire drama of the film. Everyone felt it needs a lot of feminine emotions and that’s what was missing – how a woman feels under certain circumstances. Everyone felt I should supervise it. I said it’s fine, but I said I cannot look after everything. So they got another director, who had done a lot of short films. When he came in, he gave his opinions about what had to be done, what had to be matched in wider shots and what needed to be inserted in shots of drama. We had to take care of resources. He felt extremely pressurized and refused to do it. By that time, the schedules were rolling. He had done some recce. During that time, I was sure I would do some portions but never thought it would be my directorial debut. Till then I was working like a volunteer. Being a sensible human being, if an investment is being made, then I really want them to recover. Republic Day is the only time when I can meet the target audience,” Kangana told Masand.

After Sonu Sood stepped down from the project, reports suggested that the reason was a tiff between him and Kangana. Kangana had mentioned right after the incident through a statement, “Sonu and I haven’t even met since the last shot with Krish (director) last year. He is busy filming Simmba. He couldn’t even give us tentative dates to match combinations with other actors. The producers showed him the film and writers narrated the patchwork to him. He refused to meet me. He vehemently denied to work under a woman director, which is kind of amusing because Sonu is a dear friend and I have even launched the music of a film that he produced at his request. Even though the team suggested that they have full faith in me, it seems, Sonu had neither dates nor faith. And when I last spoke to him, he suggested that I can go ahead with someone else and when I narrated the script to Zeeshan Ayyub, he called the studio and gave the dates. By that time, it was too late as Zeeshan gave me dates for September. Now I hear I had a showdown with him. When I never met him, never directed him, when did I have this showdown?”

The film had to be reshot because the team wasn’t happy with how Krish shot the film. Kangana cleared the air on why it took over two years to be completed. She told Masand, “So we called Vijendra sir and said this (difference between script and real film shoot) is a matter of concern for us and how do you feel about it? He being the sensible artist and writer, said, ‘The material that I wrote is meant to be evolved. If it doesn’t evolve from where it was, I will be disappointed. Let him do what he’s doing. We’ll see when the edit happens. Then I’ll speak about how I feel about the evolved material.’ That happened. It was supposed to be an April release. By that time Krish was very confident about the film and he’s moved on with another film. Meanwhile the team saw the film. Prasoon sir, Vijendra sir and the studio. Not to say whether it was better or worse but everyone was very confident that it is not the film which they set out to make. That’s when they decided to go back to the original script.”

When asked about the rumours of the producers being sacked because of budget constraints, Kangana almost blasted and said, “If you talk about ethics, if we’ve shot for 50 days, I can tell you an epic where 220 days of reshooting has happened. What are you talking about budget? We’re not even 1/3rd of Padmaavat! The scale and magnitude of it is quite decent. The kind of creative cause we’ve taken is only because people find a lot of gossip material when it involves a girl. They’ll say maybe she’s playing the woman card, but I can tell you names about women who do massive patchwork.”

We’re just happy that the film has achieved what it aspired to, and is going to be available for the world to see soon enough!

(All images via File Photos)