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Arjun Rampal on Daddy: It is a very hard-hitting and real film; will suffocate you
Arjun Rampal gets candid about his upcoming release Daddy in an exclusive interview with PINKVILLA.
Arjun Rampal starrer Daddy's trailer which released recently left us all gawking. Arjun will be seen playing the role of gangster-turned-politician Arun Gawli in this biopic-drama.
Gawli was referred to as 'Daddy' because he was considered the Robin Hood of his chawl and was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2012 after being proved guilty of murdering a Shiv Sena leader.
Looking at the trailer and Rampal's uncanny resemblance with Gawli, it seems this might turn out to be one of the most poignant roles of his career.
Daddy's trailer gets you hooked from the very first minute- thanks to Arjun's impeccable personification of Gawli's look and body language against the backdrop of blazing guns and bloodshed. The fire in Arjun's eyes is gritting.
We met Arjun to chat with him about his upcoming movie and much more.
Here's an excerpt from the interview:
We have all seen the trailer of Daddy and it is very impressive. What about Gawli intrigued you that you decided to take up this role?
Every actor at some point in their life wants to play a gangster. When I got an opportunity to do such a film and research it and get into the writing aspect of it, I knew it has to be something good. When I started researching about Arun Gawli, I was amazed at the phenomenal journey he has had. A great rise and rise and then lot of falls and he has still risen after that fall which is very unlikely for a gangster story. This was more of a human story, allowed you to explore his area of Mumbai which was controlled by this man. A story of a man who was not called 'dada', or 'don' but daddy because he obviously must have touched a lot of hearts. But then at the same time, we had to take care to not make this a propaganda. He was also a confide of Dawood Ibrahim but then he did not run away, he served his sentence, came out and wanted to reform but the society thought has he reformed or not or is it just a mask? So there was a lot to explore. 
It is often seen that films based on gangsters end up glorifying them. Your comments?
We are not doing that. We are not saying that this is the right thing and he should have done that or not. It is about a guy who has served his sentence, come out and what have we done as a society? Do we really forgive that guy? Depends, right? That 'depends' becomes the story. It explores various shades, it is about entering this world and explore it.
How is this gangster-based film different than other films?
What I really liked about the story was that we won't be glamorizing it or he won't be shown as a hero. He won't be doing bare-chested fight scenes or jump off buildings the cables. It is going to be real and hard hitting and will suffocate you.
How did you manage to get consent from Gawli and his family to make a movie on him?
It took a while and took a lot of convincing, talking, explaining and being honest about it that it is not going to be glamorous. Credit goes to Arun Gawli, he said you are right, the people should know what it is and how this world is.
How much time did you take to get into the skin of Arun Gawli's character, to get his mannerism and body language right?
I saw a lot of his videos, met him in person, worked on the script from conceptual level so that kind of helped me get the character well.
How much of the film is real and how much of it is fiction?
A lot of things we also create, a lot of things he will tell you. What we have done is a lot of scenes are real life incident, we have taken cases which he is acquitted from. The film is about an investigating and during this investigation, we explore what other people think about him and through that, we try to recreate incidents that must have occurred.
How was your experience playing one of the most dreaded gangsters?
It was a very tiring experience, sometimes the easiest of scenes were difficult to shoot. I think the jail portions for me were the most emotionally draining.
Since the movie has a political subtext to it, was there any apprehension as to how political parties he was associated with would react to the movie?
The things which are in public domain are there, we go through his political career but we didn't want to make it very political based film. We have treated it as a thriller, so there is an investigation going on and him running against time. It has nothing controversial in it.
Daddy is all set to release on July 21, 2017.
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