In an unlikely collaboration, Anurag Kashyap and Bobby Deol have come together to work on Bandar. Anurag recently revealed in an interview that Bobby was told when he was 40 that he needs to learn acting. The director said that the actor dedicatedly worked towards his character in the upcoming film.

In an interview with Lallantop, Anurag said, “Bobby told me something that really struck me. He said, ‘When I turned 40, someone told me, Bobby, you need to learn how to act. No one ever told me that in my childhood.’ And he took that to heart. That’s why, when he did Aashram or Love Hostel, he played characters completely unlike who he is in real life. He once told me, ‘I’m doing roles that can make you hate yourself.’ But I’ve seen how deeply he wants to inhabit these characters, and that gives me a lot of satisfaction.”

He added, “Bobby wasn’t insecure for even a second, and that’s why his performance rose above everything. He never once lost his confidence, and because of that, he even started improvising for the first time. I didn’t even have to say ‘cut’ — he would deliver entire scenes in a single take. He did things in this film that he’d never done in his life, things he didn’t even know he was capable of. But he had so much trust in me, and I made sure never to break that trust.”

Bandar, also starring Sanya Malhotra, has been co-written by Paatal Lok creators Sudip Sharma and Abhishek Banerjee. It had its world premiere recently at the Toronto International film festival 2025.

Meanwhile, Bobby was recently seen in Aryan Khan’s debut web-series, The Ba***ds of Bollywood, which came out on Netflix on September 18. Anurag’s latest release was Nishaanchi, which released in theatres on September 19.