PR Friends CC - i/o - Page 6

Originally posted by: AreYaar

Nish yaar🤗....How could I ever forget you guys either? It was such a journey from the days in the Sushita AT, discussing all their BTS clips, so many dance performances, the journey onto JDJ, the excitement of KPC being made, then released....it was a heady time. And we were so proud of the both of them, and so happy for them too.

Sushant-Ankita were literally the first and last offscreen couple I followed this closely. So it will definitely remain a powerful memory and I will always cherish those fun discussions we all had.

Anuuu! 🤗

Aww yes those were time and now I'm kind of glad we have those memories, it was crazy, fun everything!

It is so lovely to read your posts Anu, you write so well!

Originally posted by: AreYaar

By the way, does anyone here have the video of Sushant's JDJ performance about Karna's story in Mahabharat? That is the one clip I'm not being able to find no matter how many sites I search.

I had it way back in some old laptop but I can't seem to find it in my old files :/

Here you go,

drive.google.com/file/d/1-zq7w8NzXAKfkg4fsvg8pD95xYJXl_Cd/view?usp=sharing

I really was preparing to write something today because it is still hard for me to observe this news.

Also, you all write so well! I really missed reading all these thoughts.

Today I saw pictures, videos of Ankita which I shouldn't have so I'm even not sure what to write or tell anything rather I'm gonna lay back and read you guys expressing things eloquently.

Originally posted by: --Minks--

I remember that phase when they had broken up and there were too many articles about Ankita - her clinginess, aloholism, blah blah.... I hated that phase and couldn't reconcile that to the people behind these articles - whether if it was fake or mud-slinging, I got fedup I think.

Whatever we had all seen of the couple till that point was so pure and sincere, that the way it ended made it all the more worse to digest. You can sometimes see the signs of distancing etc in a relationship, say Ritvik -Asha, it felt like they were drifting apart. With these two, it was just too sudden and most likely ended by Sushant.

She really looked after him like a baby, so just this whole concept of them breaking up was so bizarre. Ankita's struggle was apparent to all, she took a long time to get back to normal it seems and came out stronger from it. Not sure if there were lingering guilt on Sushant's part, when he recently wished her luck on her role in a movie I think recently, or nostalgia. He maybe realised what he had lost, or could be anything, guess we will never know.

Just such a sad horrible end to such a lovely person, that I remember of. His dances in JDJ were the best. I don't remember his partner's name in the show, but she was so brilliant, and coupled with Sushant's talent and hard work, they were the best that season. Don't think I even watched the show again.... its all just a can of old memories which have opened up and there are soo many fond memories of Sushant and the couple.

Her name is Shampa and yes, I agree her and Sushant were stupendous in that season of JDJ and deserved to win. Sadly, they didn't get their due....she later went on to win a later JDJ season with Ashish Sharma....but her choreography with Sushant still remains her best work.

Re: Ankita....Yes, I think it's pretty obvious that she was deeply attached to him and loved him with all her heart and soul. The fact that he reached out on his own to comment on that Manikarnika picture or that they later even caught up over coffee showed that even as the relationship may be no more, what they shared was so deep that some form of affection for each other would always remain. When a relationship has been that deep, one cannot fully detach from it no matter how it fell apart.

I do think Sushant missed her in some ways but they both also seemed to have reached the understanding that time had moved on and they can never go back to what once was.

Originally posted by: sensodynee

Here you go,

drive.google.com/file/d/1-zq7w8NzXAKfkg4fsvg8pD95xYJXl_Cd/view?usp=sharing

Thank you so much! Man, it's been so long since I saw this one! I've seen O re Piya, the horror act, the Luka Chhupi and others so many times but for some reason, just couldn't find this one. So glad you still have all these clips. I'm creating a folder and saving all I can this time so I don't lose the videos again. Never thought it would become so difficult to access these videos years later since Sony decided to delete all it's old JDJ epis after the show transitioned to Colors....smh.

I don't know if I'm looking for patterns in things but it's eerie that many of his dance performances and even his movie performances seem to have his character dying in the end.....like even Karna dies at the end of this act. His character dies at the end of the horror act too. His first movie had Ishaan dying....then Mansoor in Kedarnath too. Surreal co-incidence.

But man, this is still one of the most awesomely conceived and executed acts in JDJ's history....the grace and poise with which Sushant-Shampa performed this👏

Originally posted by: sensodynee

I really was preparing to write something today because it is still hard for me to observe this news.

Also, you all write so well! I really missed reading all these thoughts.

Today I saw pictures, videos of Ankita which I shouldn't have so I'm even not sure what to write or tell anything rather I'm gonna lay back and read you guys expressing things eloquently.

It's ok yaar....take your time. There is no pressure to write anything....you can express whenever you feel like it, or remain silent. It's important to give emotions time to be processed.

Re: Ankita....sigh I saw the pics and clips too. She looks so....frail in some of them. Especially the one where the paparazzi are hounding her outside Sushant's house after she came from visiting his family. I can't even imagine how she must be feeling....she was so close to his family - I remember there were so many pics of her with his sisters and nieces...she practically was part of the family too.

She's a strong girl who managed to overcome a big heartbreak once and finally began to find mental peace....I hope she is able to find the strength to bear this time too. Some things may remain unsaid and unresolved forever now. But that is life....we can't predict or control these things.

Originally posted by: AreYaar

Now I don't recall the timeline of the breakup that clearly but all I remember was that it felt pretty abrupt and sudden to me....one day he was professing his undying love for her and then a few weeks later it was total blacklisting.

Girl I gotchu, I inadvertently documented the entire buildup and explosion in my DMs. In a way I am thankful for it because it prevents me from feeling unsure of myself the way I was yesterday.

I'm going to write it out, partially because it might help me finally come to terms with it 4 years later... but if any of you don't want to think back to that (which is totally reasonable) then please stop reading here!

SO as was previously mentioned, his behavior had been changing gradually starting around sometime in 2015 I would say, but peaking in 2016. It flows with the timeline of DBB not performing so well at the box office, both of them getting on social media, and him signing Raabta / getting chummy with the Maddock crew. There was an increase in chamchagiri-type of behavior online with other bollywood actors, which wasn't something he had done much of before and was kind of off-putting, but this was uncharted territory so I thought he would get better at it with time. He also often ignored Ankita's posts, (which makes me think about your point of how corrosive and unproductive social media can be...) and I don't know what we were looking for (a like? a retweet? what difference does it really make?) but somehow it just didn't look right. Then out of nowhere he was being really affectionate with her in public (that Filmfare video gave me LIFE lol) so we rationalized away the previous things that felt odd. Then it was March and we noticed he was showing up everywhere to events alone, which wasn't new but was different from the month before. He also appeared to be at a hotel in a picture or two, but actors often seem to do that so they are closer to where their event is. This was also around the time when the onslaught of gross articles from "sources" were coming out... she slapped him, she doesn't like his costars, she stops him from doing things etc. From previous experience we knew that the majority of these articles were exercises in creative writing, so there was no reason to suspect it was building up to anything. I remember the other Anu and I were feeling kinda uncomfortable with it all, but there was nothing concrete that had happened so we figured it was our welcome to the real bollywood PR machine. THEN on March 24th we both suddenly noticed they weren't following each other on social media, and boom the first articles started coming out about a breakup. I very clearly remember sitting in my car before work (so nighttime in India) panicking and wondering what the heck was happening. However, a bit later Ankita tweeted something that denied it so of course we believe her and tried to calm everyone down... And then the next day... in big bold front page news everywhere she was a clingy jobless jealous alcoholic who just got dumped. Cue his cryptic tweets right into the news cycle before he disappeared to Croatia or wherever. Ashu had confirmed with one of Ankita's relatives as well, which meant it was really over, though in the following days it did seem like Ankita was trying to hold on before she retreated into her shell (and seemingly didn't leave for like a year). That is as much information as was available publicly about what happened. In the time following it (after Ankita stopped trying to deny it, which was really heartbreaking), they never really spoke directly about it and Sushant regularly changed the topic when the question came up.

Now I'm editorializing, but the whole "drifted apart" was total bs, anyone that kept up with it could see it was the opposite of drifted apart and it appeared to be a one-sided decision. Man I felt like the wind was knocked out of me that day... In hindsight now I can see where we started to spot the red flags of changes in his behavior and how at times things just didn't feel right, particularly in the week or two before it blew up in our faces. I can't speak to what caused it or what went on in their home, but what you expressed was how I felt about it as well. When I write it out it was definitely abrupt. Though I can describe parts of it now as "build-up" (almost like we were manipulatively being primed to expect bad news about them) it was still contained within a couple of weeks, which is sudden for a relationship that lasted that long with a seemingly one-sided end to it.

Feels relieving to let it out... Back then it all happened so suddenly that most of us really didn't process it at all. I know I didn't. I tried to act for a while like I was over it but I wasn't... probably won't ever be truly "over it" given how much they meant to me for a long time. I'm sad that this is what it took for me to collect my thoughts and really face head on why I was so resentful of him, but here we are...

One thing I've been thinking about (among many)...

Did any of you see that article when the news broke referencing a statement from Mahesh? Essentially saying he was being treated for depression but stopped taking his antidepressants. Though something like this is the culmination of many factors that we probably never knew about (and now never will), part of it just appears to be hiding in plain sight... patients both on antidepressants and those who have stopped antidepressants (esp if suddenly) are at an increased risk of suicidal ideation and an increased risk to act on those ideations. The FDA boxed warning itself (for certain drugs) was based off of data for adolescent populations (iirc), but it's pretty well documented in cases where patients describe how sudden and overwhelming the feeling is.

I may just be trying to find a method to cope with it in a way, by only considering the clinical nature of it and not everything else I know about him. But it is a very real and terrifying situation patients can face, and in my opinion, messages about adhering to treatment regimens under professional supervision and normalizing having monitoring/support networks in place deserve some more attention than the current agendas that have taken over in the name of his death.

Speaking of Mahesh, I can't imagine what he's going through. To have any of this happen and then have it all on public record... I hope he is able to find and accept professional help for it when he is ready.

Originally posted by: toothbrush13

I feel like all of the current coverage fails to account for the person he was before bollywood, and it really saddens me.

Yes , and it isn't even one article or one comment in some social media site. Literally everyone from bwood having been talking about his interest in astrophysics and quantum physics. There have been many observations about his awkward body language and replies in interviews. All this has been attributed to his shyness and introverted-ness and how he couldn't connect with anyone because of these reasons.

Sorry, but I have never bought it. Yes, he has always been reading science-y books , but in all the years he did TV and even after the first film, do you ever remember that everything that was spoken about him was only about his intellectual interests? Or him being this painfully shy person? No, he wasn't that.

I have always felt that something about the SDR promotions experience made him very self conscious and he lost his confidence to be himself. There have been times I have felt that he wasn't that confident about communicating his thoughts in conversational English the way he could in Hindi - and just put way too much pressure on himself to cover that up. That's where it all started - the lack of confidence. That led to overcompensation through exaggerated body language and enunciations - in interviews, movie press conferences, and other public appearances. Later , it morphed into philosophical interview replies and revamping his social media accounts. Then the narrative of "I am awkward, introverted, painfully shy - so I can't put my thoughts well in words"

You only have to read the accounts of his coactors from PR who have been remembering him. They haven't been talking about how he used to talk science to make conversations.

Originally posted by: toothbrush13

Girl I gotchu, I inadvertently documented the entire buildup and explosion in my DMs. In a way I am thankful for it because it prevents me from feeling unsure of myself the way I was yesterday.

I'm going to write it out, partially because it might help me finally come to terms with it 4 years later... but if any of you don't want to think back to that (which is totally reasonable) then please stop reading here!

SO as was previously mentioned, his behavior had been changing gradually starting around sometime in 2015 I would say, but peaking in 2016. It flows with the timeline of DBB not performing so well at the box office, both of them getting on social media, and him signing Raabta / getting chummy with the Maddock crew. There was an increase in chamchagiri-type of behavior online with other bollywood actors, which wasn't something he had done much of before and was kind of off-putting, but this was uncharted territory so I thought he would get better at it with time. He also often ignored Ankita's posts, (which makes me think about your point of how corrosive and unproductive social media can be...) and I don't know what we were looking for (a like? a retweet? what difference does it really make?) but somehow it just didn't look right. Then out of nowhere he was being really affectionate with her in public (that Filmfare video gave me LIFE lol) so we rationalized away the previous things that felt odd. Then it was March and we noticed he was showing up everywhere to events alone, which wasn't new but was different from the month before. He also appeared to be at a hotel in a picture or two, but actors often seem to do that so they are closer to where their event is. This was also around the time when the onslaught of gross articles from "sources" were coming out... she slapped him, she doesn't like his costars, she stops him from doing things etc. From previous experience we knew that the majority of these articles were exercises in creative writing, so there was no reason to suspect it was building up to anything. I remember the other Anu and I were feeling kinda uncomfortable with it all, but there was nothing concrete that had happened so we figured it was our welcome to the real bollywood PR machine. THEN on March 24th we both suddenly noticed they weren't following each other on social media, and boom the first articles started coming out about a breakup. I very clearly remember sitting in my car before work (so nighttime in India) panicking and wondering what the heck was happening. However, a bit later Ankita tweeted something that denied it so of course we believe her and tried to calm everyone down... And then the next day... in big bold front page news everywhere she was a clingy jobless jealous alcoholic who just got dumped. Cue his cryptic tweets right into the news cycle before he disappeared to Croatia or wherever. Ashu had confirmed with one of Ankita's relatives as well, which meant it was really over, though in the following days it did seem like Ankita was trying to hold on before she retreated into her shell (and seemingly didn't leave for like a year). That is as much information as was available publicly about what happened. In the time following it (after Ankita stopped trying to deny it, which was really heartbreaking), they never really spoke directly about it and Sushant regularly changed the topic when the question came up.

Now I'm editorializing, but the whole "drifted apart" was total bs, anyone that kept up with it could see it was the opposite of drifted apart and it appeared to be a one-sided decision. Man I felt like the wind was knocked out of me that day... In hindsight now I can see where we started to spot the red flags of changes in his behavior and how at times things just didn't feel right, particularly in the week or two before it blew up in our faces. I can't speak to what caused it or what went on in their home, but what you expressed was how I felt about it as well. When I write it out it was definitely abrupt. Though I can describe parts of it now as "build-up" (almost like we were manipulatively being primed to expect bad news about them) it was still contained within a couple of weeks, which is sudden for a relationship that lasted that long with a seemingly one-sided end to it.

Feels relieving to let it out... Back then it all happened so suddenly that most of us really didn't process it at all. I know I didn't. I tried to act for a while like I was over it but I wasn't... probably won't ever be truly "over it" given how much they meant to me for a long time. I'm sad that this is what it took for me to collect my thoughts and really face head on why I was so resentful of him, but here we are...

Oh thanks for providing this detailed summary, TB. I think I had some vague idea that it might have been something like this but didn't know the details. I was digging through my old posts the other day and found my last comment in the bolly forum regarding this was in some thread about the breakup news....and I was literally saying this same thing only....that this breakup clearly came suddenly and wasn't thought through very well cuz just 3 weeks before that, they were seen being quite affectionate publicly and doing their usual gushiness about each other. As you said, a 7 year long relationship doesn't break that way....never this abruptly. There are many signs along the way even if there is an impending rift. Those signs just weren't happening in this case. So the only conclusion someone can draw is that the decision was taken abruptly and was not mutual.

All I remember is the barrage of sudden negative coverage about Ankita basically trying to paint her as a crazy shrew who was dragging Sushant down. It was really ridiculous and a bunch of people were quick to pile on to it. In the end, it was presented almost as if Sushant couldn't bear her so he cut the cord and Ankita was so clueless that she couldn't accept that he'd broken up with her. That is the worst memory from that phase that I still remember.....Ankita giving quotes in the initial day or two that none of this news is true and that she loves Sushant unconditionally and then a day later, he posts some ridiculous tweets or something on social media and takes off. One could almost feel the silent shattering as Ankita realized he had tossed her aside in such a way. There was no explanation, nothing. Just a totally abrupt break....and then as you said, they never really addressed it in any interview even years later. That itself speaks volumes.

Yes, off late they were back to being kind of polite and cordial even in speaking about each other in interviews but the moment of break was definitely handled in a terrible manner. Which is again why I'm saying there seems to be a precedent for Sushant acting rashly for whatever reason. It seems like he did it in Ankita's case too, whether it was someone egging him on to break up with her for his career's sake or whether it was some other internal fallout, we can't say....but the decision itself seemed to be taken rashly. It also just made one wonder in some ways who was keeping that relationship together in the face of conflict and challenges.

Whatever it was, it does seem like he went through some messed up phases mentally, made some rash decisions and ultimately didn't have a support system when he needed it during a low phase.