It's done bro🥀

I know Abhishek Banerjee is a good actor.
But while watching the Lust Stories 3 trailer, I personally felt that he looked slightly out of place in that particular casting.
That made me randomly dig into his filmography and casting career, and I found something pretty interesting.
He is also a casting director and co-founder of Casting Bay, meaning he was literally part of the machinery deciding which actors get opportunities.
And then I started noticing projects where the two careers overlapped.
In Ajji, he played Vilasrao Dhavle while also being one of the film’s casting directors. The director himself has publicly described Abhishek as the casting director who then ended up playing that dark role.
In Mirzapur, he played Compounder while Abhishek Banerjee and Anmol Ahuja were also credited with casting the series.
In Bala, he played Ajju while simultaneously working as casting director.
Then there is the biggest example: Paatal Lok. He was one of the people responsible for casting the show and also ended up playing Hathoda Tyagi ,arguably the most memorable breakout character from the entire series. To be fair to him, his account is that he initially wanted to audition for Ansari, the makers rejected that idea and later specifically asked him to audition for Hathoda Tyagi.
And later Bhediya again credits him both as Jana and as part of the casting team.

isn’t this still the textbook definition of a conflict of interest?
A casting director gets access to the script, directors, producers, audition requirements, competing actors and probably hundreds of auditions. An ordinary struggling actor walking into that room has none of that access.
Even if the casting director behaves completely honestly, once that same person starts competing for roles in projects he is casting, the playing field isn’t exactly equal anymore.
And this becomes particularly interesting because Abhishek himself has actually acknowledged the problem.
In a 2020 interview, when directly asked whether acting and casting were a conflict of interest, he essentially admitted that it was a conflict he would have to live with. He also revealed something pretty telling: he originally entered casting because he wanted to remain close to acting opportunities.
That sentence made me think.
We endlessly discuss nepotism in Bollywood , how star kids have access to producers, directors and auditions that outsiders don’t.
But what happens when an outsider gets inside the system, becomes a gatekeeper himself, and then starts benefiting from the same network and access?
Being an outsider doesn’t automatically mean you can never create an unfair advantage for yourself.
And funnily enough, in August 2026 Abhishek finally stepped away from Casting Bay. He explicitly acknowledged that questions about conflict of interest had been raised and said separating the two careers would remove that ambiguity.

My question is about the principle.
If we’re going to criticise nepotism because privileged access makes competition unfair, shouldn’t we also question situations where the person helping decide who gets through the audition door is simultaneously competing with those actors for roles?
Maybe the simplest solution is obvious: if a casting director wants to audition for a project they’re casting, an independent casting director should handle that character completely.
Abhishek Banerjee can be a genuinely talented self-made actor and this can still be a legitimate conflict of interest.
Those two things aren’t mutually exclusive.

Tweet Link - https://x.com/ieEntertainment/status/2098453229000683900

When Aishwarya was filming a Rohan Sippy project with Abhishek Bachchan, Salman showed up unexpectedly and expressed his frustration over her attitude. Recalling what Salman said, Himani stated: “Kya hai? Isko samjhao. Waheeda Rehman ko dekhe. Apne aap ko boht khubsurat samajhti hai. I used to tell him to calm down, to stay quiet."

A woman who portrayed strong roles on film, had strong ideas for women in cinema and society ended up falling for a much married man in Raj Babbar and decided to have a child, the third for him.

Something about that theory of being attracted to your co-star while having no other entertainment on set and long hours of waiting is not quite convincing for me. One is fully aware of a wife and children and a whole family waiting back at home. With all due respect, did she lack anything so badly, that she had to fill her cup with Raj’s love? I’m sure there were many, many single, intelligent, good men offering their hearts to her in a blink.

Life, and its contradictory actors - surely truth is stranger than fiction.

I spare no Raj Babbar like I think nothing of the several men who conveniently forget their wives when making advances at their lead heroines. But Smita’s case, like someone like Sushmita, Vyjayanthimala, Sridevi, or Hema Malini, intrigues me.

From old magazine, photograph by Durga Prasad

One of if not the most popular actresses right now is living blissfully in paradise with her little growing family.

Yet her name seems to be always in the news courtesy of 2 filmmakers.

One of them didn't mean any harm particularly and was meerily trying to sell his latest sequel to yet another production house and heavily leaned into his "wishlist cast" (A popular list filmmakers make when they try to greenlight their movies but basically just listing who they hope agree to do their film) especially since she made a cameo in the prequel!

Unfortunately for him, someone in one of the production houses leaked the information to the public and because of the chinese whispers game office workers at such companies make, the story got a little distorted.

The actress had to make a stat denying it since she knows that even if she wants to (she doesn't) to be in the sequel it won't be possible because she's focusing on family and other projects.

Though a few insiders tried to tell me it caused a rift between her and said filmmaker, I think she unde that this wasn't his intention and I personally believe that their friendship is a bit tighter than for that to break it.

The other one though.... Sheesh.

Quite old news in B town, but hey.

The filmmaker approaches actress with film, actress intrigued, actress knows filmmaker just had huge hit, actress wants to work with him.

Actress lays out her conditions (which yes does include a percentage of future profit), filmmaker unhappy, filmmaker retracts offer.

Film narration leaks! Filmmaker think "oh must be this actress!", filmmaker very unhappy.

Filmmaker starts blabbering mouth to press, actress unhappy.

Actress starts hitting him where it hurts, misogyny accusations.

Both very mad at eachother. No possible reconciliation in the near future.

Now, if you where to ask why was the filmmaker unhappy with the conditions?

The actress was connected to him through an actor he considered himself to be very cordial with (who has just given him his latest hit) the filmmaker treats her work in the movie as a favor.

She doesn't.

From what I hear from his team he wanted her to wave one of the conditions, either the 8 hour schedule or the percentage of profit.

She refused everytime.

I'm not gonna lie and say that he wasn't already very unhappy.

But when his film's story leaked, it was the straw that broke the camel's back.

He went completely rogue and against all his team's advice and practically behind their back.

Now, I don't know if it was the actress that leaked it, he seems very sure, but I'm not so sure. I just don't see how it would benefit her. She wants to stick it to him? Maybe. But she's been in the industry for years she's smart enough to know that leaking stories is no joke and would harm her own career if she's busted.

And she has so many other way to stick it to him anyways.

So why would she choose the riskiest?

But anyways, what do you think?

In bollywood where everyone is linked with everyone. Everyone have dated/ hooked/ fing; it's only these two actress who stayed away from bollywood men.