Utkarsh Sharma blames Allu Arjun’s Pushpa 2 and Varun Dhawan’s Ba John for Vanvaas’ failure: ‘Dono mein screens ki maaramaari thi…’ | Bollywood News

Filmmaker Anil Sharma’s son Utkarsh Sharma marked his debut as a lead actor with Sunny Deol’s Gadar 2, after working with him as a child actor in Gadar. The actor collaborated with his father again on the 2024 family drama Vanvaas, which also starred Nana Patekar and Simratt Kaur. However, the film, which received mixed reviews, fell flat at the box office. In an exclusive interview with SCREEN, Utkarsh opened up about the reason behind the poor performance of Vanvaas.
He reasoned, “According to me, we analysed the whole thing and understood that our release date was a little wrong. It got subdued between Pushpa 2 and Ba John. Dono mein screens ki maara maari thi. Their screen war affected us a lot. Although, we were seeing a bit of growth in the first week, but due to very limited screens, we weren’t able to collect better. We were operating at 90-95% capacity. So, the demand was clearly there, but unfortunately, the screen war of these films impacted it. Sadly, we don’t have enough screens in India to cater to 2-3 different films at a time. Hopefully, in the future, such a thing won’t happen.”
Although Vanvaas found a new audience on streaming, the actor said he would have rather seen the audience’s reactions in theatres. “The film came on OTT and did really well. There we got good reviews from people. There’s no screen war on OTT. It’s a benefit that people will at least get access. But, I get excited theatres more. OTT was good for Vanvaas, but you don’t get the reaction from people, who watched and who didn’t. It’s like I am working from home, there’s no fun in it.”
Story continues below this ad

Also Read | Vanvaas movie review: The Nana Patekar-starrer is a plodding affair
Utkarsh Sharma also opened up about giving his nod to Vanvaas. The actor said, “I said yes to the film because I thought how will I get such a chance again? To do a family film, that too for the theatre? Bann hi nahi rahi hain cinema ke lie vaisi films ab. I felt that it was emotional and family oriented, hence I said yes to it.”
He added, “As an actor, you keep learning and growing. You understand your strengths and weaknesses and know where you could have done better. You get a chance to push the boundaries and keep on discovering yourself.”
When asked about his future projects, Utkarsh Sharma shared, “I am shooting for out and out comedy and the other one is a proper actioner. It’s fun tackling these two different birds. It’s a challenge, but I am learning with each project.”