When Apoorva Lakhia kicked Ronit Roy on the sets of ‘Lagaan’

Mumbai, Aug 17 (IANS) Director Apoorva Lakhia is known for films like ‘Shootout at Lokhandwala’, ‘Haseena Parkar’ and others but, before becoming a director, he was an assistant director, and a damn good one.

Apoorva assisted Ashutosh Gowariker on the iconic film ‘Lagaan’, and set a new trend in Hindi cinema with his gig. Apoorva once recollected on Cyrus Broacha’s podcast how he brought order on the sets of ‘Lagaan’, and the change started at the expense of Bollywood superstar Aamir Khan.

He said, “Normally every actor has a car. So I told Aamir Khan, ‘Are you serious about me coming here and changing things for you?’ And he said, ‘Yeah bro, you got to do it’. So I said, ‘Then you got to support me, listen to me’. So he said, ‘Anything you want’. And so did Reema. I told them, ‘Everyone travels in the bus, no one gets a car’.

He went on, “So, what I did was, outside the lift on every floor, I went and bought a clock. And it was synced to my watch. And I sent a memo to everyone that your watches are redundant from today. There is only one watch which matters, and it is mine. And anyone who is late for the bus, the bus will not wait for him for more than 5 minutes”.

He further mentioned that Aamir himself was last on the third day. He shared that people in the team didn’t understand what they were trying to do. He revealed how he didn’t even bother about Ronit Roy, who at the time was the head of security for Aamir.

He continued, “I thank God Aamir was late on the third day. I thought I had to wait for 4 minutes and 55 seconds. Which I did. And Ronit Roy was doing security, he refused to shut the door. And the entire bus was looking at me to see. I am telling Reema, ‘Start the bus’. She said, ‘The driver is not listening’. I told her to hold the driver by the neck. Reema did so, and I gave a kick to Ronit Roy. He ran, he fell outside the door. I said, ‘Start the bus’. We ran from there”.

“And the entire unit and cast was looking at me, Yashpal Sharma said, ‘Tomorrow Bombay bhai?’ So I said, ‘It’s okay, I will go to Bombay but people will remember. That an AD came from America for 5 days and stuck to his commitment’. So Amir came after an hour and a half because there was no vehicle. He didn’t say anything to me. He wasn’t angry, he didn’t say anything to me. And that was his way of saying good”, he added.

–IANS

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