A little less than five years after Rock On, Abhishek Kapoor is now ready with an even more ambitious film Kai Po Che!. While his Arjun Rampal and Farhan Akhtar starrer musical had turned out to be a surprise success of the season, he waited long before his next could go on floors. Meanwhile, he also made sure that his next had absolutely nothing in common with his past work.
When there is critical as well as commercial film like ‘Rock On’ behind you, isn’t it scary to disconnect yourself entirely from that and move on to something entirely different?
(Smiles) Scare factor comes in when one doesn’t want to face failure. So me being afraid doesn’t come into picture since I have spent major chunk of my life in failure. I am not afraid of going into that zone again. In fact the sheer joy and exhilaration that comes in when you actually gain success, something that I did with ‘Rock On‘, is humbling. As a matter of fact I am not even much familiar with that territory. What would be any joy and fun if you are forever in your comfort zone? It is better to get into an unfamiliar zone.
Well, you have moved into unfamiliar territories by roping in giving a break to a TV actor like Sushant Singh Rajput.
He is not any other TV actor. He has a huge fan following there and I am very proud of him. Once the film releases, everyone would see what he is capable of. In fact I showed Raju (Rajkumar Hirani) some of the rushes of Kai Po Che! and then he decided to take him on board for P.K.. Khabar nikal hi jaati hai bahar!
It is also being speculated that the film is akin to the coming together of ‘3 Idiots’, ‘Yuva’ and ‘Rang De Basanti’. How much of these references indeed come into play?
See, a whiff of that flavour is indeed there but then there is a lot more to the film. ‘Kai Po Che!‘ is definitely not the same film. There is a different emotion and drama. As for references and inclusions, you would see everything from religion, politics, cricket, love to friendship.
Talking about friendship, what’s happening on the sequel of ‘Rock On’? Since that has been on hold for quite some time, can one assume that the film is as good as shelved?
If there is a script then question of any shelving doesn’t arise. There are certain scripts that sitting with me for six years. I don’t tag them as shelved!
Joginder Tuteja tweets @tutejajoginder