Daijiworld Media Network – Mumbai

Mumbai, Dec 12: Filmmaker Anand L Rai has opened up about the reasons behind the failure of Shah Rukh Khan’s 2018 film Zero, calling it a mistake on his part for not blending the superstar’s iconic image into the character. The film, co-starring Katrina Kaif and Anushka Sharma, marked one of SRK’s biggest box office setbacks and pushed him into a four-year break from films.

Speaking to Galatta Plus, Rai said he treated the project purely as an “actor–director” collaboration, without recognising the responsibility of handling a superstar’s larger-than-life persona. “The problem with Zero was that the superstar came to me with so much love, but I never understood that his image had to be part of the film. I was working with an actor, a big actor, but I realised later that I needed to take care of that image,” he admitted.

He further noted that audiences sometimes expect a blend of both character and stardom, something he couldn’t achieve. “Maybe I am unable to incorporate that stardom into my characters. I was floating; my bearings were not there,” he reflected.

Despite the eventual box office debacle, Rai fondly recalled the filmmaking journey with SRK. “I was enjoying the journey, and more than me, Shah Rukh was. That became scary later because one of us should have stopped and said, ‘There is a star.’ He never brought it up, and I never understood it. Maybe things would have been different,” he said.

Zero, written by Himanshu Sharma and produced by Colour Yellow Productions and Red Chillies Entertainment, also featured Abhay Deol, R Madhavan and Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub. Made on a reported budget of Rs 200 crore, it earned only around Rs 180–190 crore worldwide, becoming one of SRK’s rare commercial misfires.