Nandamuri Kalyan Ram
starrer ‘
Devil - The British Secret Agent
’ is in a spot as the team has reportedly breached some of its legal commitments with the actors. It was sensational from the very beginning after director Naveen Mederam dropped the project and producer Abhishek Nama stepped into the role of the director in September 2023. Adding to this, American actor
Mark Bennington
has opened up about the huge
contract violation
that the team played with him.
When ETimes contacted Mark Bennington today, the actor decided to raise his voice against the contract violation. He says, "I do not want to sound like a poor white guy who complains about not getting paid but I want to be the voice of the voiceless who are getting treated badly in any project and shooting site."
He further talked about how the West has been treating the actors and his upcoming projects in India and more, excerpts…
What led you to say yes to ‘Devil’ and what are the hurdles that you faced in this movie?
Last year in May, I got a funny call from one of my friends. He told me that I'm playing the role of a villain in this movie. It is a huge action film that is beautifully shot, and we shot it in Hyderabad, Chennai, and other places. I’m the
British Villain
, the worst and the worst villain. I tried to bring a sort of subtlety in my acting but the team was not satisfied. They kept telling me to keep it bigger, as the character is really angry and I should act like that. The character was so angry all the time, so I wanted to give it a personal touch, slightly over the top like Telugu action movies.
What difference did you notice in the Indian film industry as compared to the West?
In general, the West film industry is a little more organised. Having said that, in OTT movies like Saas, Bahu Aur Flamingo, the process was transparent. They shared the script and contract in advance. And I got time to work on my character. It is not like you are getting everything at the last minute.
You ran into some hurdles with team 'Devil'...
The biggest problem was I had a contract with them prior to the movie about everything. So for the first few months, everything was going fine. Even if there was a little bit of adjustment with the date of payment, they did not give up on paying me well. But things changed while filming the last schedule, which was a big action sequence. Suddenly they decided not to pay me. It has been 9 months since I completed my part in this movie, but they did not pay me till date. My team contacted them and they are making random lies and excuses and promising that they will pay me soon.
Now this is crossing the limit, I saw that they used someone else’s voice for my character, and it feels like the character is not played by me. It is a clear violation of my contract in which I mentioned that I will be dubbing my English dialogue parts. It seems artificial and some random person took my body over his voice. This never happens, my experience with South is stellar, be it ‘
Captain Miller
’ or ‘Indian 2’ - I was treated well. I only heard about these issues from other actors and people but now I really feel bad and violated. I want this issue to be addressed. My contract was always honoured in other movies from the South.
What led you to open up about this issue now, and how is your relationship with the team?
I revealed this to stop such illegal actions in any movie industry. I had a good and fun time with the team of ‘Devil.’ I adorned the team, and I turned down some other projects to complete Devil’s schedule. Yes, but I would like to work more with the South film industry.
How are you holding up after all these things happened ?
This all happened as a total slap on my face. I acted with a fake beard, and I paid for it. I put my maximum effort into this movie, prioritizing it over other things. It is personally heartbreaking as I have been given loyalty, but they turned against me and did not pay me. I'm shocked and can’t say it enough.
Did you take any advice before opening up about this?
Some of my friends had similar experiences with other movie teams. I have to say that people warned me not to go public with this issue. The movie team will be hurt, and they will really get affected. How can anyone say this? I'm the one who is violated and hurt here. I really hate it when people ask me not to respond. If someone did not do anything wrong, why should they be afraid? I've worked with a lot of small and big production companies, but this never happened to me. My lawyer informed me that there is no assurance about them paying you if you take it to court.
It might be huge for you to be a part of the global success venture ‘RRR’. Can you share your future projects?
I’m so happy that I could be a part of RRR, but I’m very disappointed about the ‘Devil’ trailer as they used someone else's voice in that. My future projects are Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Heeramandi, Savarkar, Dhanush’s Captain Miller, and Kamal Haasan’s Indian 2, and I'm so happy to play these roles, and they treated me well.
Devil: The British Secret Agent - Official Teaser
English (US) ·