Actor Deepika Padukone‘s latest ad for Levi’s has landed in hot waters, as director of Yeh Ballet, Sooni Taraporevala has accused it of ‘plagiarism’.
Calling out the makers, Taraporevala posted on Instagram about the uncanny resemblance in the dance studio of the ad film and her film.
She wrote, “I was shocked to see our Yeh Ballet dance studio set in this ad because it was conceptualized & created out of a derelict space by Shailaja Sharma (our PD) from scratch and dismantled after our shoot. No such dance studio exists in Mumbai which is why we built it.”
The filmmaker added that the maker of the ad, Nadia Marquard Otzen, “saw Yeh Ballet and decided to plagiarize our set down to the very last detail.”
Showing Padukone dance to the hit 80s number ‘Auva Auva’, the ad video has been viewed over 3.8 million times on Instagram.
She questioned if Levi’s would have picked up someone else’s work had they done it in the West.
“This is not homage this is intellectual theft!”
Highlighting the copycat culture in India, Taraporevala said it needs to be “called out and cancelled.”
“You would think a foreign production company and director would know better. Are you so creatively bankrupt? What were you thinking?” she added.
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