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Paa director R. Balki reveals he almost canceled the film due to Amitabh Bachchan's height; says he felt the film was an 'embarrassment'
In a candid interview, Paa director R Balki revealed how he had almost canceled making the film due to Amitabh Bachchan's height.
Amitabh Bachchan is a megastar in Bollywood who has entertained audiences for more than five decades and in this long career, he has worked on several memorable and challenging films, such as Paa. Recently, its director, R. Balki, revealed that he had almost dropped making the film because he couldn't understand how to hide Amitabh Bachchan's long height and make him look like a 12-year-old child with progeria.
In a recent conversation with Cinemaz, Balki recalled his experience working on Paa, where he faced several challenges during initial look tests for the film. He shared that after writing the film and fine-tuning the details, he and the film's cinematographer, PC Sreeram, did a look test with Amitabh Bachchan to see what he might look like as Auro.
The Pad Man director did deep research on progeria showcased in the film and hired a special makeup artist from Los Angeles to do it. However, when the artist did the first makeup trial, the filmmaker wasn't convinced and found Big B's look scary. The test took place in Hyderabad while Amitabh was shooting for another project. Again, they reworked the lighting but felt Bachchan looked even more ugly.
The filmmaker explained that the megastar was 6'2 and big, and while planning, he didn't think about him playing a child. Since they had no prior plans, technology, or the money to shrink him, he felt it was all a big blunder.
Things became tense when Amitabh, noticing the repeated delays, questioned the need for further trials. Since Amitabh Bachchan couldn't understand the situation, R. Balki had to show him the test images, which left the room silent.
The Ki and Ka filmmaker recalled, "I told PC that I think we need to call this film off; this is not going to work. It's an embarrassment. Let's not spend any more money and run from here." At this moment, the filmmaker decided to drop the film and discussed it with Sreeram, who suggested a way of easing all the worries. PC did several more trials and found a top angle that made Big B look small. As a result, they shot him in the film from that angle.
Paa was released on December 4, 2009. It also starred Abhishek Bachchan and Vidya Balan in key roles. The film received praise and bagged several important awards of that year.
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