Karan Johar says he tried to ‘sabotage’ Alia Bhatt’s casting in Kapoor & Sons: ‘You don’t have to do every Dharma film’

Karan Johar has revealed that he tried to ‘sabotage’ Alia Bhatt’s casting in Kapoor & Sons. Karan, who produced the film under his banner Dharma Productions, shared that he had a one-on-one session with Alia wherein he asked her not to do the movie, owing to the length of her character.

Kapoor & Sons, which released in 2016, featured Alia Bhatt alongside Sidharth Malhotra and Fawad Khan. Directed by Shakun Batra, the film also starred Rishi Kapoor, Rajat Kapoor and Ratna Pathak Shah.

Speaking during an ‘Inside the writers’ room’ session on Clubhouse, Karan confessed, “I tried to sabotage her casting because I had a one-on-one with Alia and I said, ‘Listen, you don’t have to do every Dharma film. You don’t like it, you don’t do it because the part is really nothing.’ She was like, ‘Yeah, I know but I love Shakun (Batra), I’ll just hear it for him, he’s a good friend.’ I said, ‘Yeah, yeah, but don’t do it. It’s fine because it’s called Kapoor & Sons and you’re not a Kapoor in the film.'”

Alia went ahead with the script narration and returned to Karan with her decision to star in the movie. “She heard (the script) and she comes to my room and says, ‘I really want to do this film, I really love the script, I don’t care about my role.’ I thought more power to her that she actually didn’t see the footage, she didn’t see the length of the role, she just saw the film and I wish all actors in our industry thought like that,” Karan added.

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The producer-director also reminded listeners that he had reached out to six leading actors for the role of Rahul Kapoor, played by Fawad Khan, but none of the actors agreed to do it.

Back in 2018, Karan Johar had confirmed that the role was offered to six other actors before Fawad eventually stepped in. Speaking with DNA After Hrs, Karan said, “Yes, I had offered Fawad’s part to six different actors and no one did it. No matter what reasons they gave, I felt they were afraid of playing a homosexual man on screen. Having said that, they had a reason and I didn’t judge them for it.”