Happy Birthday Aamir Khan: When the actor got two British actors married during Lagaan shoot

By Subhash K. Jha -

March 14, 2024 - 4:11 PM IST

Aamir Khan had never worn a dhoti before Lagaan. He learnt how to tie it in just one day. When I had asked him how audiences would react to their hero in a dhoti, his sensible reply was, “Whether I wear a dhoti in Lagaan or whether it is a period film, all that is irrelevant. Audiences will come if they like the story.”

Happy Birthday Aamir Khan: When the actor got two British actors married during Lagaan shoot

And they did! Aamir was right. When has he ever been wrong, except Lal Singh Chadha.

The first choice to play Bhuvan in Lagaan was Abhishek Bachchan. Director Ashutosh Gowariker waited almost two years for Abhishek to say yes. Finally, Gowariker gave up. It was by chance that Aamir saw the script of Lagaan. He jumped at it. The rest as they say, was more hysteria than history. Gowariker and Khan had worked together earlier in Baazi where Aamir had dressed up in drag for the first and last time.

Recalling his association with Gowariker, Aamir in a throwback interview said, “Ashutosh and I were friends to begin with. I found him to be so sure about Lagaan. The script came from within him and he was perfectly in tune with the theme. I found myself depending on his judgment for a whole lot of things rather than the other way around. We did argue sometimes. But nothing major. You must remember that we had been discussing and taking decisions about the film long before the shooting actually began.”

The first choice for the heroine’s role was Aamir’s favourite Rani Mukerji. But then Rani was busy. Lagaan needed two months’ dates at a stretch for the shooting in Bhuj. Rani didn’t have them. Aamir and Gowariker than decided to cast a newcomer. More than forty fresh faces were shortlisted before Gracy Singh was chosen.

The late and much missed Nitin Desai was given the task of building a set in Bhuj to resemble a village from Colonial India. Aamir told me, “We built a whole village set in Bhuj. The locals were extremely helpful. We used a lot of local people to build the set. Though Nitin Desai designed it, we used the local labour force to construct the set. We liked certain local architectural designs in Bhuj. We used them, so that our village didn’t look like a set. The land that we used belonged to the local people. It was agricultural land. We rented the land for one year and paid them what they would have earned by farming during that one year. We had to give them back the land as we had found it.”

Two of the British actors in Lagaan got married in Bhuj while shooting. Recalled Aamir, “Actually we had forty junior artistes of which twenty came from London. One of the actors Jamie had come with his girlfriend (Katkin). They mentioned to us that they planned to get married in India following Indian customs after shooting. One of us suggested that they get married right there in Bhuj. I happily agreed to the marriage in the temple on our sets with elaborate sangeet, mehndi, etc.”

Immediately after the release of Lagaan, Aamir in a rapturous interview said, “The mainline press including The Guardian, Time Out and other big daddys out there have called it a crossover film. They say Lagaan would do for Indian cinema what Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon did for Chinese cinema. Unfortunately, Lagaan hasn’t been marketed like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. Ang Lee’s film was released internationally two years after it was shown in its native country. When it was shown to an international audience, it was marketed accordingly. Right now, you must remember whatever impact Lagaan is making internationally is without any marketing effort. It has been released as an Indian film for Asians abroad like any Hindi film. There was just one show for the British audience. Whatever international audience we’re getting is due to word-of-mouth publicity. I’m now pushing my overseas distributors to tap the international audience. You see, the press in Britain have responded very positively to Lagaan. Once a film is liked, there’s no stopping it.”

Aamir was quite taken aback by the response to Gadar: Ek Prem Katha. “I’ve seen fairly big hits in my career. But nothing like this. We can’t really comment on its full box office impact as yet. Right now, it’s a little presumptuous of me to say this, but I think it’s heading towards being my biggest hit. I can definitely say that the public reaction to Lagaan is unlike anything in my career. All my distributors, some of whom have been in this business for 40 years, tell me the same thing. Frankly, I don’t know how it happened. I haven’t orchestrated the media coverage. I normally set aside a month for the promotion of all my films. I’ve done exactly that for Lagaan,” said Aamir.

Also Read: From Lagaan to 3 Idiots: Aamir Khan’s Top 5 performances