When Aamir Khan accused Yash Chopra, Ram Gopal Varma of lying: ‘It hurts tremendously when they do this’

In a 1997 interview, Aamir Khan spoke about filmmakers Yash Chopra and Ram Gopal Varma. Reacting to comments made by the directors about Aamir in relation to their films Darr (1993) and Rangeela (1995), the actor had said ‘they simply tell lies’. Aamir also said it hurt him ‘tremendously when they do this’. Aamir had opened up about the filmmakers taking potshots at him in their interviews at the time. Also read: When Aamir Khan replaced Divya Bharti with Juhi Chawla in Darr, she called out his ‘starry attitude’

Aamir was responding to the late Yash Chopra’s accusation that he wanted to know exactly how many punches he would give Sunny Deol and vice versa, when he was offered the role that Shah Rukh Khan eventually did in Darr. Meanwhile, in another interview, Ram Gopal Varma had discredited Aamir’s contribution to the success of Rangeela, which featured Aamir alongside Urmila Matondkar. In a 1997 interview, Aamir had said that Ram Gopal Varma ‘was feeling insecure because he was getting a lot of credit for the film’s success’. Aamir also responded to Yash Chopra’s statement that he had second thoughts about playing a negative role in Darr.

Aamir told Rediff, “They don’t fail to understand my approach. They simply tell lies. Yes it hurts tremendously when they do this. Regarding Yash Chopra’s accusation I’d like to put things in perspective. In the first narration he told me that Sunny (Deol) and I would fight but it would be Juhi (The woman whom I was obsessed with and harassing) who would kill me. That was poetic justice. Then I came to know that he had narrated a different climax to Sunny in which Sunny would kill me. So I asked for a joint narration. I was concerned about my screen image. I was certainly not going to be beaten up by a regular hero in a regular commercial film. See, I didn’t mind being beaten up by Deepak Tijori in Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar because that was a different kind of film. But if you have a casting coup like Sunny and me then I certainly don’t want to be beaten up by him or even Arnold Schwarzenegger for that matter. Is there anything wrong with that?”

Recalling his interaction with the late filmmaker, Aamir further added, “When Yashji told me it would be an equal fight in the climax I asked him what he meant by that and he said both of us would have an equal number of punches. These were his words, said in the presence of cameraman Manmohan Singh and scriptwriter Honey Irani. In any case it made more sense to have a heroine who has been terrorised all along killing her tormentor. Yashji has also said that I had second thoughts about playing a negative role. Far from it… in fact, I would not have glamorised the role the way it was done in the film if I had done it. The character had a mental problem and it should have been played accordingly.”

Interestingly, Divya Bharti was the first choice of filmmaker Yash Chopra for the film Darr, but was later replaced by Juhi Chawla. Aamir was also later replaced by Shah Rukh Khan. Darr was released in 1993 and starred Juhi, Shah Rukh and Sunny Deol in lead roles.