New Delhi: Filmmaker Anurag Kashyap has fired back at Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos following the latter’s recent comments about Sacred Games. During an appearance on Nikhil Kamath’s WTF podcast, Sarandos spoke about Netflix India’s evolution, mentioning popular titles like Sacred Games, Heeramandi, CID, and The Kapil Sharma Show.
In the podcast, Sarandos expressed doubt over the decision to launch Netflix India’s original programming with Sacred Games. He suggested that, in hindsight, something more “populist” might have been a better starting point.
“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 was interesting was that it was very, very novel,” Sarandos said. “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 added: “If I did it all over again, would I have done Sacred Games a couple of years later and started with something more populist instead? Maybe. We knew that India was going to be a slower journey to reach our goals. But it’s a great prize at the end of the day. The addressable market is growing in India in the next couple of years, so it’s exciting.”
Following Sarandos’s remarks, Kashyap responded sharply, calling the Netflix CEO “dumb.”
Sharing his response on Threads, Kashyap wrote:
“He should have started with Saas-Bahu… he would have done well. Which he is doing now :)) I always knew the tech guys are dumb when it comes to storytelling, but @tedsarandos being the definition of dumb — that I didn’t know. Good to discover that. This explains everything now.”
Sacred Games was Netflix India’s first original series, directed by Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane. The show, which starred Saif Ali Khan and Nawazuddin Siddiqui, gained massive popularity for its gritty storytelling and cinematic scale.
However, the second season received mixed reviews, and the show was ultimately not renewed for a third.
