Samrat Prithviraj director reveals Akshay Kumar shot film in 46 days, calls it ‘first historical made in shortest time’

Samrat Prithviraj, starring Akshay Kumar in the titular role, was a rare period drama by the actor. Written and directed by Dr Chandraprakash Dwivedi, the film marked the film debut of former Miss World Manushi Chhillar as princess Sanyogita. Now a video clip from the film’s team’s appearance on The Kapil Sharma Show features Dr Chandraprakash talking about how quickly the film was shot. Also read: Samrat Prithviraj box office day 10 collection: Akshay Kumar’s film falls flat, records 82% drop on second weekend

As he started opening up about the shoot of the period drama on the show, the Samrat Prithviraj director said, “This would be first historical movie of India which is made in the shortest span of time.” When Archana Puran Singh asked him about how long did it take to complete the film, he said, “We finished it in 100 days.”

He further revealed, “You all might be surprised to know how many days were there for Akshay. Only 46 days.” Kapil reacted to him, saying “wah (wow).”

As the clip was shared on Reddit, many viewers were of the opinion that “they should’ve taken more time”. Some said the film was made in a hurry which led to its below par performance at the box office.

Samrat Prithviraj opened in theatres on June 3 with collections of ₹10.70 crore. It’s 10 day-collections stand at ₹63 crore. It recorded a 82 percent drop in its second weekend.

During the promotional interviews of the film, Akshay had said the education ministry needs to take cognisance of the contribution of Hindu kings and “balance” out their stories with those of Mughal emperors who enjoy more space in school texts. He said, “it’s sad we don’t know about our own kings”.

“There were only three-four lines about Samrat Prithviraj in the history books that I read. Thanks to this film, I got to know so much about him. I don’t think anyone else also knew about him,” he told PTI in an interview.

“When I was talking to my son about him (Prithviraj), he said ‘I know about the British empire, Mughal empire, but who’s he?’ So it’s a sad thing that we don’t know about our own kings. There were only a few lines about Rana Pratap, Rani of Jhansi. But there are a lot of chapters on Mughals,” he added.