‘Shah Rukh Khan is still a superstar’: Yash says KGF beating Zero doesn’t make him bigger, ‘I’m still his fan’

Seven years on, Yash is revisiting the box-office face-off that first announced him on a pan-India stage, and even with KGF: Chapter 1 having outperformed Shah Rukh Khan's Zero at the time, the Kannada star remains unequivocal about whose stature stands taller.

The actor is currently gearing up for the release of Geetu Mohandas' Toxic: A Fairytale for Grown-Ups, due in theatres on August 26. The film's arrival has already prompted Maddock Films to shift the Shraddha Kapoor-led Eetha, directed by Laxman Utekar, off its original August 28 slot.

Given how Yash's last high-profile clash played out, the move looks like a prudent one. KGF: Chapter 1 had released alongside Aanand L. Rai's Zero on December 21, 2018. Despite Zero carrying the star power of Shah Rukh Khan, Anushka Sharma and Katrina Kaif, Yash's Kannada action drama edged past it at the worldwide box office.

In an upcoming episode of Aap Ki Adalat, Yash addresses that clash directly, and makes clear the result never dented his regard for Khan. He said he remains a fan, noting that theirs was the smaller film at the time and Khan's the bigger one, which was just how the release fell into place. “I’m still his fan,” Yash said in a promo of his upcoming Aap Ki Adalat episode. “We were a small film. Shah Rukh sir’s film was bigger, so we released ours,” he added.

The numbers, in hindsight, tell a modest story either way: Zero collected roughly Rs 191 crore worldwide, while KGF: Chapter 1 brought in close to Rs 250 crore globally. But Yash is careful not to read that gap as any verdict on where he stands relative to Khan. As he put it, Khan is a superstar, and the moment he considers himself bigger than his seniors is the moment he's finished. “He’s a superstar. The day I think I’m bigger than my seniors, I’m done,” he claimed.

This isn't the first time Yash has addressed the Zero clash. Around the film's original release, he maintained that the overlap was never a calculated move against Khan. His reasoning centred on scale: with KGF releasing simultaneously across five languages, the team needed a date that worked for every market's distributors, not a date chosen to compete with anyone.

He acknowledged that a clash was inevitable in a market like Delhi, but expressed confidence that a strong film would ultimately hold its own regardless of what it released against, adding that no single film could claim the entire country and that room typically exists for two or three releases to coexist.

KGF: Chapter 1 was originally shot in Kannada and released in dubbed versions across Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam. Backed by Hombale Films, with Farhan Akhtar and Ritesh Sidhwani's Excel Entertainment handling North Indian distribution, it became the highest-grossing Kannada film of its time, a record its own sequel would later dismantle. KGF: Chapter 2, released in 2022, crossed Rs 1,200 crore worldwide, cementing itself as one of Indian cinema's biggest global successes.

Yash's upcoming project, Toxic: A Fairytale for Grown-Ups, is co-written by the actor alongside director Geetu Mohandas, and produced by Venkat K. Narayana's KVN Productions in association with Yash's own Monster Mind Creations. The ensemble cast includes Nayanthara, Kiara Advani, Huma Qureshi, Rukmini Vasanth, Tara Sutaria and Akshay Oberoi. Shot simultaneously in Kannada and English, the film will see Yash take on a dual role.