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Did you know Yash Chopra was adamant about casting Manoj Bajpayee in Shah Rukh Khan’s Veer Zaara? Here’s why
Manoj Bajpayee in a recent interview revealed the real reason why Yash Chopra was adamant about casting him in Shah Rukh Khan and Preity Zinta starrer Veer Zaara. Read on.
Manoj Bajpayee is currently gearing up for the release of his film Bhaiyya Ji. The action-thriller will mark a milestone in the actor’s career as it will be his 100th movie. Recently while speaking with Siddharth Kannan, Manoj looked back at the time when Yash Chopra got very adamant to cast him in Veer Zaara.
Why was Yash Chopra so eager to work with Manoj Bajpayee?
It was in 2002 when several of Manoj’s movies were seeing doomsday at the box office and his film Pinjar was one of them. Despite the movie failing commercially, the movie won Bajpayee a National Award for his performance. Pinjar acted as a fortune for him as it eventually landed him in a YRF movie.
He detailed, “I got a National award for Pinjar. But it did not work at the box office. But you know what Pinjar gave me? It gave me Veer Zaara. Yash ji saw the film and he was mesmerized and he was adamant on getting me to do that role in Veer Zaara.”
Manoj Bajpayee who believed that it took mountains to be worthy of starring in a Yash Chopra film recalled the filmmaker telling him, ‘Son, this will happen now because I don’t know when I’ll work with you. I don’t make films for actors like you).” For the unversed, Manoj made a special appearance in the movie where he played Raza Sharazi, Zaara's fiancee.
Veer Zaara was led by Shah Rukh Khan and Preity Zinta alongside Rani Mukerji, Boman Irani, Kirron Kher, and Divya Dutta in pivotal roles.
In the same interview, Manoj spoke about going through tough times and expressed, “The down that I have seen, I hope nobody gets to see. When you have to do a film just because ‘ab paisa khatam ho raha hai, ghar kaise chalega.’ Outside people didn’t know, there is nothing there in that big home.”
Manoj’s next film Bhaiyya Ji will arrive in theatres on May 24 and is being bankrolled by Vinod Bhanushali, Kamlesh Bhanushali, Samiksha Oswal, Shael Oswal, Shabana Raza Bajpayee, and Vikram Khakhar. It also stars Suvinder Vicky, Jatin Goswami, Vipin Sharma, and Zoya Hussain.
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