Ektaa Kapoor calls Anurag Kashyap 'dumb' after he mocks saas-bahu dramas: 'You are so...'

Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos recently said on Nikhil Kamath’s podcast that he had doubts about launching Netflix Originals in India with Sacred Games. His comment didn’t go down well with filmmaker Anurag Kashyap, who strongly criticised him and took a sarcastic jab by saying he should’ve just made daily soaps instead.

This didn’t sit right with Ektaa Kapoor, who fired back at Anurag. She accused him of looking down on content made for the masses and called his comment classist, standing up for the shows and audience that helped shape Indian television.

Reacting to Ted Sarandos’ comment on Sacred Games, Anurag Kashyap took to Threads to express his frustration. He wrote, “He should have started with Saas-Bahu… he would have done well. Which he is doing now. I always knew tech guys are dumb when it comes to storytelling, but I didn’t know tedsarandos is the definition of dumb. Good to discover that. This explains everything now.” 

Ektaa Kapoor, who recently collaborated with Netflix, responded sharply to Anurag Kashyap’s dig at saas-bahu shows. Taking to Instagram, she wrote, "You are so dumb... saying this puts you at an advantage 'I'm smarter, cooler' but naaaaaaaa! Darling, how about gracious!!! and self-aware?????? An art that a lot of artists don't have! 'Saas bahu' and their impact on Indian masses (how women got a voice in mass India) is well documented by prestigious Chicago research!"

Though Ektaa didn’t mention anyone directly, she added, “But artists who talk of an inclusive world are actually more classist. We must do away with this ‘U can’t sit with us, we’re better’ attitude for democracy and fair play! Love n light to all (sic).” Her words highlighted the irony of some artists promoting inclusivity while holding elitist views.

For the unversed, Ted had said, "Our very first Indian original show was Sacred Games. And I thought, ‘This is going to be great. People in India love movies. This is a TV show that feels as big as a movie, it has movie stars.’ What’s interesting about it is that it was very, very novel, but what I didn’t understand [was] that we were introducing a brand new kind of entertainment in a country the size of India."

He continued, "For me, if I did it all over again, would I have done Sacred Games a couple of years later, and did things that were more populist (instead)? Maybe. But we knew that India was going to be a slower journey to get to where we wanted to get to. But it’s a great prize, at the end of the day. The addressable market is growing in the next couple of years in India, so it’s exciting."