The awaited grand and flashy drama ‘The Royals’ premiered on Netflix last week. Despite the initial buzz, the show failed to impress viewers. Several netizens criticised Bhumi Pednekar’s casting. Moreover, several viewers criticised the lead pair’s casting, Ishaan Khattar’s shirtless scenes, and even Zeenat Aman’s cameo. Following this, the show’s director, Priyanka Ghose, opened up on the row of criticism.

Speaking with India Today, ‘The Royals’ director broke silence on the criticism against the show. Speaking of Bhumi’s casting, she said, “With Bhumi’s casting by Netflix, I was actually very open to the idea of trying this new pairing. They are both such powerful actors, and I was excited to see them embody glamorous roles, which goes against both of their works so far. While Ishaan hasn’t got a chance to play a glamorous mainstream hero role, Bhumi has always been like the queen of heartland India.”

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Weighing on the chemistry debate, Priyanka said, “If it didn’t work for some people, I will try better next time. But there are also people who enjoyed the show and their chemistry. It’s crazy how polarised the feedback has been.” Moving ahead, the director also talked about Ishaan’s shirtless scenes. She stated that the scenes were as per the script’s requirements. Moreover, both Ishaan and the team made it a point not to go overboard with it.

“Honestly, every shirtless scene of Aviraj existed in the script that I was given. Also, those moments were quite natural, and we never really thought it was forced or overkill. Also, Ishaan is a very aware and intelligent actor, and wouldn’t have agreed to take his shirt off at the drop of a hat. He is always very conscious of that, and there were times when he even discussed if we were overdoing it. There was actually an amazing fashionable wardrobe for him, and we would have loved to use more clothes on him.”

Continuing, Priyanka also spoke of Zeenat Aman’s limited cameo in the series. “It was never meant to be a full track. Whenever we have legendary superstars making cameo appearances, we crave more, and the same happened with Zeenat ma’am. As much as I would have loved, the script had only those many scenes.”

Coming to the cliffhanger end of the first season, the director spoke of the sequel possibilities.  “When we were filming it, there was constant banter on sets, and we used to joke about what we would do in Season 2. But I don’t think any of us had given any serious thought to what it would be. Also, the way PNC (Pritish Nandy Communications) works, the directors will only come in after they have kind of written the script. So, as far, we have no idea about what’s been planned, but we could wait for the producers to make a formal announcement.”

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Netflix’s ‘The Royals’ stars Ishaan Khattar and Bhumi Pednekar in lead roles. It also features Sakshi Tanwar, Milind Soman, Nora Fatehi, Vihaan Samat, and Dino Morea, among others.