Ananya Panday reads the riot act to Anurag Kashyap in a Tresemme ad

When Priyanka Chopra, essaying the titular role in Mary Kom, said “don’t frighten me so much that I stop feeling fear”, a droplet of that defiance could be seen in Ananya Panday when she stood up to director Anurag Kashyap after he mocked her and her celebrity antics. 

Yes, “Bandra Panday”, as Kashyap addresses the actress while discussing her shot with assistant directors, gives him a dressing down in a new ad for Tresemme.

A brainchild of advertising agency Braindad, the film shows Kashyap annoyed because Panday’s hair makes it appear as though she has visited a salon, something the shot, according to him, absolutely does not need. She insists she has not and has only used the new Hydra Matrix range from Tresemme.

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Interestingly, when Panday reacts to Kashyap, she exclaims that there is now a problem with her hair as well. It is a small wink of self awareness, considering how people have responded to her performance in the recently released Tu Meri Main Tera Main Tera Tu Meri.

Another recent example of this kind of self awareness was Spotify’s Wrapped campaign in India, where Emraan Hashmi grows annoyed because the same Parvez who fanboyed him to nonsensical levels in Netflix’s B**Ds of Bollywood is indifferent to him in the audio streamer’s ad.

Such moments matter in today’s advertising because viewers, confronted by a cacophony of content, are no longer satisfied with run of the mill commercials.

This is also not the first time Panday and Kashyap have appeared in an ad together. They first shared screen space in a series of Cadbury Perk commercials six years ago. Titled 'Masti ka Daily Dose', the ads were along a similar line. Kashyap is rehearsing for a Perk commercial shoot with Panday, but the actress says she's not available for the shoot as she has to go for yoga. The series then follows how Kashyap uses the rehearsal footage to mock fun at her and how Panday gets it back.