Ananya Panday was ‘uncomfortable’ doing Liger co-starring Vijay Deverakonda, reveals Chunky Panday: 'I said you do this...'

During a recent conversation, Ananya Panday’s father, Chunky Panday, revealed that the actress was uncomfortable doing Liger co-starring Vijay Deverakonda. Read on to know why.

By Krishma Sharma

Updated on Feb 06, 2025 | 11:39 AM IST | 9.4K

Pic Courtesy: Ananya Panday Instagram and Liger IMDb

Ananya Panday and Vijay Deverakonda shared screen space in the 2022-released Liger. Despite much buzz around the film, it bombed at the box office. Nearly three years later, Chunky Panday got candid and shared that his daughter was initially hesitant about doing the film. She felt that maybe she was too young to do the part.

During a recent conversation with Mashable India, Ananya Panday’s father and veteran actor Chunky Panday revealed that the actress was "uncomfortable" doing the film. He shared that when the actress reached out to him, she was apprehensive about doing the film, thinking she was "too young" to do it. However, it was he who insisted she do the film.

"She said, ‘Papa, I am too young to do this.’ I said you do this; it’s a commercial, a big film, but maybe she was right. She was too young to do it," revealed the Housefull 5 actor. He noted that Ananya was only 18 years old and had an innocent baby face when she entered the industry.

Addressing Liger, the veteran actor stated, “She was uncomfortable. She said, 'Maybe I am too young for this.' She was confused then,” admitting that he has not given her career advice since that time. According to Panday, he is old-school and for him, a movie mounted on a great scale with dialogues, songs, and action would qualify to be a great film. He admitted that if she had asked her if she should do Amazon Prime Video’s Call Me Bae, he would have refused.

The 2022-released Liger was directed by Puri Jagannadh and marked Vijay Deverakonda’s Hindi language debut. It was backed by Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions and Puri Connects.

During an earlier interaction on the YouTube channel of We Are Yuvaa, Ananya humorously blamed her father for advising her to do the film.

On the professional front, Ananya has an exciting line-up of projects in the pipeline. It includes Kesari 2 alongside Akshay Kumar and R Madhavan. It is a biopic based on the life and work of the late lawyer and statesman Sir Chettur Shankaran Nair, set against the backdrop of the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre.