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‘Na main uska baap hun, na boyfriend,’ Aamir Khan defends casting Fatima Sana Shaikh in Thugs of Hindostan after she played his daughter in Dangal

Aamir Khan said that no one wanted to play Fatima Sana Shaikh's role in Thugs of Hindostan, and Alia Bhatt, Deepika Padukone, and many others rejected it.

Fatima Sana Shaikh and Aamir Khan in Thugs of Hindostan.

Aamir Khan hasn’t experienced many flops in the last 25 years of his career so when a film like Thugs of Hindostan released amid much hype, it was a massive shock for his fans. While the film recorded a massive opening at the box office, of around Rs 50 crore, it was unanimously hated by fans who rejected it in just a couple of days. In the last few days, Aamir has repeatedly said that he too, was extremely unhappy with how the film had turned out and tried to convince producer Yash Chopra and director Vijay Krishna Acharya that the film needed many changes before it could be presented to the audience. In a new interview, Aamir shared that many leading film actors, including Deepika Padukone, Alia Bhatt, Shraddha Kapoor rejected the part that was ultimately done by Fatima Sana Shaikh. He added that the director had his reservations about casting Fatima in the role as Aamir had played her father in Dangal, and here, he was supposed to play her lover, so Vijay decided to chop their romantic track from the film.

In a chat with The Lallantop, Aamir Khan shared that Aditya and Vijay had a problem with casting Fatima in the role of Zafira. “When we were casting for it, no other female actor said yes to this part. Deepika, Alia, Shraddha, they all refused. That film was offered to the entire industry but no one wanted to do it,” he said and when asked if they rejected it because it was poorly written, Aamir said that this could have been the reason behind their refusal. He shared that while the makers chose Fatima as she tested for the part, and fit in, they decided that “we won’t have a romantic track between you and her because she was your daughter in Dangal, how can she play your girlfriend here? Audience will reject this.”

“I don’t believe in all of this. Main asal mein thode uska baap hun, aur na asal mein main uska boyfriend hun. Hum log film bana rahe hain bhai (I am not her father in real life, and neither am I her boyfriend in real life. We are making a movie),” he said and recalled that Amitabh Bachchan and Waheeda Rehman have played mother and son, and have also played lovers in films. “Audience is not this stupid that they will think that he is the actual father. We are underestimating our audience if we say that,” he said.

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In the same chat, Aamir Khan revealed that they never made the original script of Thugs of Hindostan as it kept getting modified. After the film was made, he got a call from Aditya Chopra where in he was told, “I have seen the first cut and it is a brilliant film. You have no idea what you have made.” Aamir said that when he watched the film, he was “shocked” because he found it to be “really bad.” “I told them I didn’t understand it and at first, they thought I was joking. I told them this won’t work for a day,” he said and added that they went on discussing the film for the next 6-8 months and he would “fight with them every day that we have made it all wrong. This is structurally incorrect.”

Aamir Khan explained that in the original film, Amitabh Bachchan’s character was supposed to die during the interval, but the changes modified the story completely. “Vijay and Aditya were both convinced and they were very happy with it and they did not want me to interfere with it. They are the director and producer of the film and they have the final say,” he said. When asked about the title of the film, Aamir said that he found it to be “extremely misleading” but recalled that Aditya wanted to make a Pirates of the Caribbean-like film, hence he went with it.

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