City of Dreams (TV series)

City of Dreams is an Indian political drama television series which is available on Hotstar on its new label Hotstar Specials from 3 May 2019. It is directed by Nagesh Kukunoor starring Atul Kulkarni, Priya Bapat, Sachin Pilgaonkar, Eijaz Khan, Siddharth Chandekar and Adinath Kothare. Music is composed by Tapas Relia.

It received mixed reviews with praise for Kulkarni's performance and criticism for writing and direction.

Conception
The idea for the show came from Kukunoor's team member, Rohit Banawlikar. Banawlikar and Kukunoor co-wrote an anthology, intended to be turned into a feature film. But as digital platforms grew in India, Kukunoor felt that there was a scope for a series.

Plot
Multiple lives intersect after an assassination attempt on Mumbai's most polarising political figure. A single stone thrown in a seemingly placid lake sets off a series of ripples that affect everyone and hurt many. City of Dreams is the story of the feud within the Gaikwad family, which erupts after an assassination attempt on a polarizing political figure. Blurring the lines between moral and immoral, in a struggle for power forms the core of this transfixing narrative.

Cast

 * Priya Bapat as Poornima Gaikwad
 * Siddharth Chandekar as Ashish Rao Gaikwad (Season 1)
 * Eijaz Khan as SI Wasim Khan
 * Atul Kulkarni as Amey Rao Gaikwad 'Saheb'
 * Sushant Singh as Jagan Hejmadi 'Anna' (Season 2)
 * Devas Dixit as Raja
 * Vishwas Kini as Goutam (Season 1)
 * Sandeep Kulkarni as Purushottam
 * Rakesh Dubey as Inspector Siddhesh Laad (season 2)
 * Uday Tikekar as Jiten Kaka (Season 1)
 * Amrita Bagchi as Katrina (Season 1)
 * Sachin Pilgaonkar as CM Jagdish Gurav
 * Shishir Sharma as Ramnik Bhai
 * Flora Saini as Mystery Women, Asha
 * Ivan Rodrigues as Nambiar (Season 2)
 * Geetika Tyagi as Shireen Ali
 * Rio Kapadia as Commissioner Roy
 * Saurabh Goyal as Koushik Amre
 * Pavleen Gujral as Lipakshi (Season 1)
 * Lekha Prajapati as Lipakshi (Season 2 - replaced)
 * Adinath Kothare as Mahesh Arawle
 * Divya Seth as Vibha
 * Ankur Rathee as Arvind Mehta
 * Vibhawari Deshpande as Manjari
 * Gauransh Chauhan as Rashid
 * Atisha Naik as Asiya
 * Sajjad Khan as Bhairav Pal
 * Shriyam Bhagnani as Tanya Mehta
 * Sunit Razdan as Dabolkar

Promotion
On 21 April 2019, Hotstar Specials released the teaser for City of Dreams on YouTube and other social media platforms announcing the release of the series on 3 May 2019. The show will consist of 10 episodes.

Reception
Upon release, Gautaman Bhaskaran of News18 rated the show a 2 out of 5 and said "Kukunoor gives away too many clues, and viewers can easily guess how the series will pan out".

Udita Jhunjhunwala of Firstpost rated it two stars and was of the opinion that the show was longer than necessary and the show missed a tight script and several scenes were dispensable.

Soumya Rao from Scroll.in reviewed that "the protagonists were iterations of characters that have been seen often on the screen".

Ektaa Malik from The Indian Express critically reviewed the show and stated "With Nagesh Kukunoor as director, the expectations were high from City of Dreams. Even the repeated, but not-needed, ‘strong language, violence, nudity and sex’ — used as labels for the show — do nothing to salvage it."