Vikramaditya Motwane wanted Aamir Khan and Akshay Kumar for AK Vs AK; says he was nearly thrown out of Akshay’s office

In the Netflix film AK Vs AK (2020), an actor and filmmaker get locked in a fierce physical and psychological battle after a public spat on an industry panel. Anil Kapoor and Anurag Kashyap played fictionalised versions of themselves in the Vikramaditya Motwane film. Recently, the filmmaker revealed that both Anil and Anurag weren’t the original choices for the project. The script was originally written for Aamir Khan, and when Vikramaditya went to approach Akshay Kumar for the part, he almost made him leave his office. (Also read: Vikramaditya Motwane reveals if Sanjay Leela Bhansali is a ‘megalomaniac’, says he ‘drove him nuts’)

The black comedy featured actor Anil and director Anurag Kashyap feuding with one another. In the film, Anurag even kidnaps Anil’s daughter Sonam Kapoor (played by his real-life daughter) and sends the actor on a hunt to track her down. Anil’s brother, producer Boney Kapoor, and his son Harsh Varrdhan Kapoor also had cameos in the film.

In an interview with Mid-Day, the filmmaker shared that they were originally looking at Aamir and Akshay for the film. Vikramaditya recalled, “Writer Avinash Sampat, who’s now become a good friend of mine, sent the script to us. He’d written it for Aamir [Khan] first. I was sure Aamir is never gonna do it, so let’s not even try!”

He continued, “There is Akshay Kumar, who we did approach, and it was a very interesting meeting – I mean, he didn’t sort of outrightly say, ‘Get out of my office,’ but it was close enough! For a while, I was making it with Shahid [Kapoor], which kind of happened, and then it didn’t. The [actor] AKs kept changing. The [director] AK, that is Anurag Kashyap, was a constant. He’s a fantastic actor.” Eventually, Anil and Vikram’s frequent collaborator Anurag were cast in the main roles.

Vikramaditya’s latest project Jubilee is streaming on Prime Video. In the web series, the filmmaker looks at the early days of Indian cinema after India’s independence in a fictional story. The show stars Prosenjit Chatterjee, Aparshakti Khurana, Sidhant Gupta, Aditi Rao Hydari, Wamiqa Gabbi and Ram Kapoor. Vikramaditya has co-created the period drama with Soumik Sen.