- Saturday, April 01, 2023
From personal problems to film failures, the stars who had a year to forget
By: ASJAD NAZIR
Eastern Eye on Friday (16) published the annual list of Top 50 global Asian stars of the year.
The countdown celebrates those who have made a mark, broken new ground, and shown general all-round awesomeness. So for the sake of fairness and balance, this is a look, in no particular order, at 20 celebrities who had moments in 2022 they will want to forget.
Rahat Fateh Ali Khan: Video footage of the Pakistani singer, allegedly while drunk, went viral across social media and triggered a tidal wave of negative attention. Sadly, that wasn’t the first time he has made a fool of himself while apparently being intoxicated.
Kangana Ranaut: The boastful actress continued her horrific run of box-office failures with one of this year’s biggest film flops, Dhaakad.
Vijay Deverakonda: The talented Telugu cinema superstar made an awful Bollywood debut with arguably the year’s worst commercial Indian film Liger. He seemed to be over-confident ahead of its release, and got a rude awakening when the film failed to excite audiences.
Ayushmann Khurrana: After flying high for a few years, the once golden boy of Hindi cinema came crashing down in 2022 with three box-office disasters. The failure of Anek, Doctor G and An Action Hero have plunged him into a career crisis.
M.I.A: The Sri Lankan British rapper discovered that out of sight really is out of mind with Mata, her first album release in six years. It didn’t chart anywhere and was a commercial failure, despite receiving great reviews.
Karan Johar: His overhyped superhero adventure Brahmastra struggled to recoup its eye-watering budget and his film Liger was all kinds of terrible. The filmmaker’s other home productions were also underwhelming, and he quit Twitter after being severely trolled.
Taapsee Pannu: After a few years of riding high on critical and commercial successes, the actress had a catastrophic year with six flop films. None of the poorly made movies justified her undeniable talent.
Daler Mehndi: The Punjabi music icon was given a two-year jail term in a human trafficking case. He was taken into custody for two months in July and then released on bail, pending an appeal.
Akshay Kumar: Seemingly concentrating on quantity over quality did not serve the actor well in 2022. A truly terrible year saw him deliver five disastrous film releases in seven months.
Neha Kakkar: The singer received a torrent of abuse for her terrible cover version of Falguni Pathak song Maine Payal Hai Chhankai. She also released forgettable pop songs and didn’t have any Bollywood success.
Chiranjeevi: The legendary actor had two high-profile releases with big-name co-stars and
both were rejected. His Telugu language films Acharya and Godfather turned out to be gigantic failures.
Feroze Khan: The Pakistani actor became public enemy number one after his ex-wife Syeda Aliza Sultan accused him of domestic abuse and shared shocking photographs of the alleged violence. He denied the allegations, but the damage seems lasting.
Naga Chaitanya: The Telugu’s star film Thank You bombed at the box office, and his hotly anticipated Bollywood debut Laal Singh Chaddha failed, likely preventing more Hindi cinema projects.
Prabhas: The pan-Indian star had a year to forget. His critical and commercial failure Radhe Shyam was followed up with a terrible trailer for his planned next film Adipurush. The first look received such a backlash that it has reportedly been postponed until 2024.
Arjun Kapoor: The poster boy of nepotism added to his seemingly endless list of flop movies in 2022. Other Bollywood stars with famous family links who delivered dud films included Aditya Roy Kapur, Parineeti Chopra, Tiger Shroff, Ananya Panday, and newcomer Abhimanyu Dassani.
Ajay Devgn: The actor ruined Eid and Diwali with terrible films Runway 34, and Thank God, respectively. He scored a success with Drishyam 2, but those releases were two of the worst Bollywood holiday releases of all time.
Shehnaaz Gill: The TV star and actress may have a huge fanbase, but she was unable to back it up with any meaningful projects in 2022. By agreeing to star in alleged sex offender Sajid Khan’s next film 100 Percent and backing him on TV, she damaged her brand and, many feel, women’s rights in India.
Zayn Malik: He may have generated a lot of global media attention, but very little happened for the pop superstar on the music front. The British singer also had to deal with rumours that his ex-girlfriend Gigi Hadid has started dating Leonardo DiCaprio.
Ranbir Kapoor: The actor followed up the 2018 blockbuster Sanju with epic 2022 failure Shamshera. Although Brahmastra clocked up decent numbers, it struggled to recoup its massive budget and likely killed what was a planned trilogy.
Tanishk Bagchi: The music director released several songs in 2022 and nearly all of them were exceptionally awful. The most heavily trolled ones across social media were terrible cover versions of classics songs Aap Jaisa Koi and Maine Payal Hai Chhankai.
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