Nawazuddin Siddiqui calls Bollywood ‘chor’, slams industry’s lack of originality : Bollywood News

May 4, 20253 Mins Read

Bollywood actor Nawazuddin Siddiqui, currently promoting his upcoming film Costao, shared his views on the state of the industry during an interview with Puja Talwar on her YouTube channel. He expressed concern over the lack of originality in Bollywood, criticising the trend of copying other sources and describing the industry as being in a phase of creative stagnation.

Nawazuddin Siddiqui calls Bollywood 'chor', slams industry's lack of originality

Nawazuddin Siddiqui calls Bollywood ‘chor’, slams industry’s lack of originality

The Gangs of Wasseypur actor addressed the rising sense of insecurity within the Bollywood industry and said, “In our industry, the same thing is repeated for five years straight — then, when people get bored, they finally let it go. Actually insecurity bohut badh gayi hai. Unko lagta hai ek formula chal raha hai toh usse chala lo, ghiso isko. Aur usse bhi pathetic yeh hogaya ki yeh 2, 3, 4 (sequels) hone lag gaya. Kahin na kahin jaise bankruptcy hoti hai, vaise yeh creativeruptcy hogaya. Kangaliyat hai bohut zayada. Shuru se humari industry chor rahi hai. Humne gaane chori kiye, story chori ki (Actually, insecurity has increased a lot. They feel that if a formula is working, they should keep milking it, overdo it. And what’s even more pathetic is that now there are 2, 3, 4 [sequels] being made. It’s creative bankruptcy, just like financial bankruptcy. There’s a lot of creative poverty. From the beginning, our industry has been stealing. We’ve stolen songs, we’ve stolen stories).”

Nawazuddin added, “Ab jo chor hote hain, voh kahan se creative ho sakte hain. Humne south se churaya, kabhi yahan se churaya, kabhi wahan se churaya. Even some cult-films which became hits, unke scenes bhi chori kare hue hain. Isko itna normalise kardiya gaya ki chori hai toh kya hua? (Now, how can thieves be creative? We’ve stolen from the South, sometimes from here, sometimes from there. Even some cult films that became hits have scenes that were copied. This has been so normalised that it’s like — so what if it’s stolen?). Earlier, they used to hand over a video and say, ‘This is the film we want to make.’ They’d watch that and just replicate it here. What can you expect from an industry like this? What kind of actors will come in? They’ll be of the same kind. And then actors and directors start quitting — like Anurag Kashyap, who was bringing in good work.”

Nawazuddin Siddiqui stars as Costao Fernandes, a Goa customs officer who risks everything to take down a gold smuggling ring, in the biographical crime drama Costao, directed by Sejal Shah. Also featuring Priya Bapat, Kishore, Hussain Dalal, and Mahika Sharma, the film is currently streaming on ZEE5.

Also Read: Nawazuddin Siddiqui DEFENDS Salman Khan over Sikandar’s underwhelming box office performance: “If the directors don’t work properly, we can’t blame the superstars”