Anurag Kashyap and Abhay Deol did not work together again after Dev.D in 2009. In 2020, the filmmaker said that working with the actor was 'painfully difficult' as he demanded the benefits and luxuries of being a 'Deol,' while the actor recently rejected these claims, calling the director a liar and toxic person.
In a recent interview, Anurag said that it was Sushant Singh Rajput's death in 2020 that made him call Abhay and apologise. He also said that three weeks before his death, somebody from Sushant's team reached out to him, but he declined to work with the late actor, which made him feel guilty about Deol.
In an interview with News18, the director said, "The day when the unfortunate incident surrounding SSR happened made me feel so bad. Three weeks prior to that, somebody was trying to reach out to me because he wanted to talk to me. But I said no because he had ghosted me once, and I didn’t know how to talk to him. I felt these pangs of guilt. That’s why I reached out to Abhay and apologised to him because somebody had told me that he was upset with me because I spoke publicly about him."
He further added, "I told him that he can yell and scream at me, but I needed him to tell me that he was okay. That episode also made me realise that I need not speak about everything. I came to know that he’s still upset, but I’m ready to apologise to him again. I can apologise to him ten times. But I’m happy that an actor as brilliant as Abhay is back. He’s so good."