Karenjit Kaur – The Untold Story of Sunny Leone
- Karan Shrikant Sharma (season 1 & 2)
- Niranjan Kaushik (season 1)[1]
- Sunny Leone
- Bijay Anand
- Grusha Kapoor
- Raj Arjun
- Karamvir Lamba
- Anurag Shanker (season 1)
- Tallz (season 2)
- Sanjay Mehta(season 1)
- Sudhir Narayan Sherigar (season 2)
- Shahnawaz Iqbal Dabhoiwala (season 2)
- Kishor Arora
- Akash Chawla
- Shareen Mantri Kedia
- Arunava Sengupta
- Keiko Nakahara (season 1)
- Priya Seth (season 2)
- Jitendra Prakash Dongare (season 1)
- Sandeep Kurup (season 2)
- Namah Pictures
- Fresh Lime Films
21 May 2019 (2019-05-21)
seasonsStoryKarenjit Kaur – The Untold Story of Sunny Leone is a Hindi-language streaming television series. The series captures the journey of former pornstar-turned-actor Sunny Leone, born in a middle-class Sikh family, and her makeover from being an innocent girl to an adult film actress and eventually a Bollywood star. The twenty-episode series premiered on ZEE5 on 16 July 2018 in multiple languages, including Malayalam, Bengali, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Marathi.[4][5]
Description
The biopic stars Raj Arjun, Rysa Saujani, Karamvir Lamba, Bijay Jasjit Anand, Grusha Kapoor, Vanish Pradhan and Marc Buckner. Karenjit tells her story on her terms, in her inimitable style – one with no regrets. Right from her reasons for getting into the adult industry, choosing the name Sunny to owe meeting her husband to the industry itself.
Directed by Aditya Datt and written by Karan Sharma, the series reveals her history, family, boyfriend-turned-husband Daniel Webber and traces lesser-known facts about her transformation from an adult film star to a popular actress.[6]
The show was primarily shot in Cape Town and Mumbai. The shoot was over by May 2018.
Cast
- Sunny Leone as Herself
- Rysa Saujani as Young Karenjit[7]
- Bijay J. Anand as Jaspal Singh Vohra
- Grusha Kapoor as Balwant Kaur Vohra
- Raj Arjun as Anupam Chaubey, a news anchor
- Karamvir Lamba as Sundeep[8]
- Vansh Pradhan as Young Sundeep
- Marc Buckner as Daniel Weber : Karenjit's Husband.
- Johan Badh as Nate
- Joanna Robaczewska as Tanya
- Ritu Shivpuri as Neena, Jaspal Singh Vohra's love interest
- Manoj Singh Panwar as Manager
Episodes
Series | Episodes | Originally released | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 10 | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) | ||
2 | 6 | 18 September 2018 (2018-09-18) | ||
3 | 4 | 5 April 2019 (2019-04-05) |
Season 1
No. overall | No. in season | Title [9] | Directed by | Written by | Original release date |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 1 | "Talking Tough" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
2 | 2 | "City of No Angels" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
3 | 3 | "Virgin Mary" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
4 | 4 | "Taking the Plunge" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
5 | 5 | "Birth of Sunny Leone" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
6 | 6 | "The Devil Wears Nothing" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
7 | 7 | "As Bad As It Gets" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
8 | 8 | "Love at First Sight" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
9 | 9 | "The Black Sheep" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
10 | 10 | "A New Chapter Begins" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 16 July 2018 (2018-07-16) |
Season 2
No. overall | No. in season | Title [9] | Directed by | Written by | Original release date |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
11 | 1 | "Beat around the Bush" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 18 September 2018 (2018-09-18) |
12 | 2 | "Guilty of Doing It our way" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 18 September 2018 (2018-09-18) |
13 | 3 | "Is It Happily Ever After?" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 18 September 2018 (2018-09-18) |
14 | 4 | "The Princess and The Frogs" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 18 September 2018 (2018-09-18) |
15 | 5 | "The Last Wish!" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 18 September 2018 (2018-09-18) |
16 | 6 | "Time to Say Goodbye" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 18 September 2018 (2018-09-18) |
Season 3
No. overall | No. in season | Title [9] | Directed by | Written by | Original release date |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
17 | 1 | "Born to be a Chef!" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 5 April 2019 (2019-04-05) |
18 | 2 | "Princess Finds Her Prince" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 5 April 2019 (2019-04-05) |
19 | 3 | "It’s Time to Grow Big!" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 5 April 2019 (2019-04-05) |
20 | 4 | "Flight to India…" | Aditya Datt | Karan Shrikant Sharma | 5 April 2019 (2019-04-05) |
Reception
First Post made a statement that the screenplay of the series is cleverly written and portrayed Karenjit's life perfectly.[10] The writer did a great job by not implying the sexual references and focus more on other aspects of her life. Sunny Leone's performance in her own life story is applaudable as she had to live her life and relive all the good and bad experiences all over again.
Hindustan Times[11] rated the series with 3/5 stars. The main focus of the story is on the girl raised in a conservative Sikh household and her journey from becoming an adult star and entering Bollywood. The series displays her story with a bit of a melodrama that gives it the feel of a daily soap. The actors in the webseries nonetheless, play it subtly.
The Indian Express says that the webseries was surprisingly a smooth ride.[12] They were also critical about a few melodramatic scenes with few moments of poor acting. The series show parts were one can understand that Leone has always been the dignified and hard-working individual she is admired for today. However, Leone hardly has any screen time in the pilot of the series, and she did perform well on screen.
The Quint[13] gave a review of the series getting quite good responses in season 1. The first season shows most parts of Leone's love life. The new season, however, is much more interesting. The most remarkable thing about season 2 is how all the 6 episodes show only bits of Leone’s porn career. The webseries clearly does not have the best production values. Anyhow, the second season makes Karenjit feel more human than ever.
References
- ^ "Karenjit Kaur Review: Precise! Satisfactory!". justformoviefreaks.in. 16 July 2018. Retrieved 11 September 2018.
- ^ "Karenjit Kaur: The Untold Story Of Sunny Leone second season announced; to premiere on 18 September". Firstpost. 21 August 2018.
- ^ "Karenjit Kaur:The Untold Story of Sunny Leone Episode 1 review:It takes nerves of steel to tell this bold tale". Archived from the original on 21 September 2018. Retrieved 21 September 2018.
- ^ "Sunny Leone's biopic to premiere on ZEE5 from July 16—Watch teaser". Zee News. Retrieved 2 July 2018.
- ^ "Sunny Leone's ZEE5 Biopic Will Conclude With Season 3 on April 5". NDTV Gadgets 360. 14 March 2019. Retrieved 13 February 2020.
- ^ "Karenjit Kaur: The Untold Story of Sunny Leone season 2 trailer charts actor's trying journey". Firstpost. 28 August 2018. Retrieved 13 February 2020.
- ^ "Rysa Saujani on playing younger Sunny Leone: The role was emotionally very challenging". The Indian Express. 1 June 2018. Retrieved 11 September 2018.
- ^ "Sunny Leone introduces Karamvir Lamba who essays her reel life brother in Karenjit Kaur - Rediff Realtime News". realtime.rediff.com. Retrieved 11 September 2018.
- ^ a b c "List of episodes". www.zee5.com. Retrieved 21 September 2018.
- ^ "First Post Review". 20 July 2018.
- ^ "Hindustan Times Review".
- ^ "The Indian Express Review". 17 July 2018.
- ^ "The Quint Review". 26 September 2018.
External links
- Karenjit Kaur - The Untold Story of Sunny Leone on ZEE5
- Karenjit Kaur – The Untold Story of Sunny Leone at IMDb