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Karan Johar’s script nearly made Shah Rukh Khan leave Bollywood: ‘The script required me to wear a skirt for the entire film’

Shah Rukh Khan and Deepika Padukone attend a panel discussion hosted by Karan Johar at the WAVES 2025 summit.

Shah Rukh Khan to attend Met Gala 2025. (Photo: Instagram/Shah Rukh Khan)

Filmmaker Karan Johar moderated a session with his close friend, superstar Shah Rukh Khan, and actress Deepika Padukone on the inaugural day of the WAVES 2025 Summit at the Jio World Centre in Mumbai. The session was titled The Journey: From Outsider to Ruler. Both the actors shared anecdotes from their careers, including Shah Rukh talking about feeling like a failure when his films did not do well.

Sharing whether he has ever thought of leaving Bollywood, SRK said, “Whenever I fail, I always feel the failure twice as much because I never do it personally and think, ‘Oh, my film flopped or my work was ruined.’ I feel that I have let down lots of people because I know in 35 years that a lot of people came to watch my movies with a lot of love in their hearts. So whenever I make a bad film, I take it very personally.”

Also Read | Waves Summit 2025 LIVE Updates

Shah Rukh Khan did, however, recall one instance when he felt like quitting Bollywood—after Karan Johar pitched him a script. SRK said, “Some years back, Karan Johar came to my house with a script which required me to be wearing a skirt throughout the film. It was one of those stories from the olden times when men wore skirts, and that is the only time I wanted to step back.”

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Karan defended himself by saying that the character was written that way, and that’s why the skirt was required, to which Shah Rukh replied, “Tu khud skirt pehenkar khud acting karna. (You should wear the skirt yourself and act in the movie.)”

Also Read | Shah Rukh Khan was unhappy with Baazigar character, wanted Abbas-Mustan to make him ‘a maniac, without any revenge backstory’: Sriram Raghavan

It’s quite fitting that Shah Rukh Khan and Deepika Padukone were chosen for this panel, as neither actors had any connection to the film business when they started out, but over the years, they’ve emerged as among the highest-paid stars in the country, in addition to being ambassadors for Indian cinema across the globe.

The WAVES 2025 Summit was inaugurated by PM Narendra Modi on Thursday morning and is designed as “a key forum for promoting discussions, collaboration, and innovation in the media and entertainment industry”.

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