Mumbai,Aug 29: Veteran actor Naseeruddin Shah, whose streaming series IC 814 The Kandahar Hijack premiered on Thursday, believes that film promotions have become obsolete and no longer stir audience interest.
During a recent roundtable discussion with his co-stars Vijay Varma, Arvind Swami, Pankaj Kapur, Manoj Pahwa, and director Anubhav Sinha, Shah expressed his views on the subject. When asked by Anubhav Sinha about his aversion to promotions, Shah remarked, “I don’t think promotions make a difference. It seems actors enjoy doing them and appearing on television to attract attention.”
Shah added that audiences intuitively know what they want to watch. He reminisced about how, in his youth, films starring Dilip Kumar would be released every two years, and fans eagerly anticipated them. “When I was in school or college, we would plan in advance to watch a Dilip Kumar film. Nothing would deter us from seeing it.”
He emphasized that the audience decides what to watch independently of promotional efforts. “Saying ‘We worked really hard on this film’ doesn’t influence the audience. It’s your job as an actor to work hard; why should you be self-congratulatory?” Shah concluded.
