Was Shahid Kapoor playing himself in Kabir Singh all this time? 

Shahid Kapoor’s latest film is the strangely-titled action thriller Bloody Daddy (streaming for free on Jio Cinema). Ahead of its OTT release, the Kabir Singh actor talked about his marriage to Mira Rajput in an interview with Film Companion. 

Now, that interview has gone viral for what many believe is Shahid turning out to be a real-life Kabir Singh. Calling marriage an attempt for women to fix men, he seemed to have a laugh while reminiscing his own marriage to Mira that is nearing eight years now. 

The question remains. After being married since 2015 and having two children with his wife, is Shahid Kapoor “fixed” yet?

Netizens were quick to draw parallels with his controversial hypermasculine character Kabir Singh whose toxic and possessive brand of love led to much debate in 2019. Much like Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s Telugu original Arjun Reddy, the character Kabir Singh is a bearded manchild who can slap anyone who comes in his way (including his own girlfriend, Kiara Advani’s Preeti). He even holds a woman at knifepoint when their kitchen sex is interrupted and brazenly runs after his domestic help when she breaks a glass. 

Kabir is established as an imperfect individual but it’s with Vanga’s glorification of the character till the very end that led many to frown. While Arjun Reddy star Vijay Deverakonda was still not that upfront in defending the character, director Vanga went all out in media interviews with his arguably toxic ideology, justifying occasional slapping your partner as true love. 

To put it in Vanga’s words, “If you don't have that liberty of slapping each other, then I don't see anything there."

Kapoor himself didn’t hold back and went on to draw a confusing method acting parallel between his take on Kabir Singh and Joaquin Phoenix’s portrayal of the mentally unstable homicidal comedian Arthur Fleck in Joker. 

Even Shahid’s mother Neelima Azeem told Mid-Day in 2019, “Tomorrow, if you play a psychopathic serial killer, will everybody watching the movie become one?” She went on to compare Kabir Singh with Heath Ledger’s Joker in The Dark Knight and Marlon Brando’s domestic abuser Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire. 

These defensive arguments were and are still trolled among those who feel that a role like Joker still doesn’t glorify violence as much as Kabir Singh glorifies toxic romance. 

In a Film Companion interview (that interestingly also featured Vijay Deverakonda), Malayalam actress Parvathy Thiruvothu was vocal about both Arjun Reddy and Kabir Singh’s comparisons with Joker. 

To quote Parvathy, “There is a fine line in showing the misogyny of the society and glorifying it. When a man is being misogynistic and if that incites applause, then that's glorification.”

The Kabir Singh controversy has definitely not deterred Shahid Kapoor, who continues making statements like it’s a women’s job to fix a man after marriage. Twitter and Reddit continue to be filled with sarcastic jabs at him. Was Shahid Kapoor ‘method-acting’ in Kabir Singh all this time? That’s food for thought. 

It is important to note what Mira Rajput has to say about this whole controversy herself (even though she hasn't responded as of now). Shahid, who is 14 years her senior, met her when she was a college student and married her when her college ended. And given the fact that Shahid himself is a father of a daughter, it feels like it's high time for Kabir Singh to see what precedent he is setting.