Alia Bhatt was shooting for Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Gangubai Kathiawadi when the lockdown was announced. The 21-day lockdown due to coronavirus outbreak left several projects in midway. Now, with no idea as to when the situation will get back to normal, filmmakers have started taking a call on their ongoing projects. Gangubai Kathiawadi is also among those films which suffered a jolt due to the lockdown.
As all shoots and releases stand cancelled until and unknown period, Sanjay Leela Bhansali has reportedly decided to demolish the brothel set constructed for his upcoming film. It was an elaborate set constructed at Film City, portraying Kamathipura of the 60s. Now as the set stands unused for the last one month, the filmmaker has asked his production team to arrange for its demolition.
A report in Mid-Day has quoted a source as saying, “In March, Bhansali had cleared the payment for the set maintenance. Even when the shutdown was announced, the team had assumed it would delay the schedule only by a month or so. However, with the situation in Mumbai looking grim, it is unlikely that the shoots will resume soon. After a round of number-crunching, it was seen that recreating the set would probably be a cheaper alternative than keeping it standing in these uncertain circumstances, as the latter entails the daily rent that has to be paid to Film City. So, the team has decided to have the set razed to the ground.”
However, the official statement regarding the same is awaited.
Earlier, the makers had unveiled two posters of Gangubai Kathiawadi in January this year. Both the posters featured Alia in two different and powerful looks. Gangubai Kathiwadi is based on Hussain Zaidi’s book Mafia Queens of Mumbai and revolves around Gangubai Kothewali, a brothel owner and matriarch of Kamathipura. The film was originally scheduled to release on September 11, 2020.
