It was a race against time for director Abhishek Pathak when, just a few days before shoot of Drishyam 3, Akshaye Khanna exited the film. The reports of the actor leaving the production surfaced in December last year when producer Kumar Mangat Pathak revealed that Akshaye, who was part of the second film in the franchise, quit after the success of Dhurandhar and over disagreements on his look and compensation. Now, Abhishek, in a recent interview, has spoken about the chaotic week after the actor quit when he had to rewrite the script and get Jaideep Ahlawat on-board.
The film was supposed to begin filming in December last week. Abhishek says that while there was no panic, the team was unhappy with how it all played out. “I won’t say panic, but we were not happy with the whole idea. I thought, ‘Ye kya tareeka hua (What is this)?’”
Jaideep was approached in a few days. Abhishek rewrote parts of the script to accommodate the new character he would play. “He was kind of replacing a character that had been liked by the audience. I called him, and he asked me, ‘Casting change or character change?’ I told him I am changing the character. Then, he read it and found it fun. All that happened within 5-6 days,” the director said.
Abhishek said that the difficult decision was about not pushing the shoot. “The tough part was the call to continue, to just tell the team: ‘Hold on, don’t cancel anything. We will do it’. Bol to diya par ab karna bhi padega. Likhna bhi tha (I had said it, but now I had to do it and rewrite things). I asked for 2-3 days to figure out if we could achieve it. We were seven days away from the shoot when we were to film his scene with Ajay (Devgn) sir,” he said.
The filmmaker further revealed that the reason he didn't cancel the shoot was that over 200 people were dependent on him and the film. “Set lag chuka tha (The set had been erected). We couldn’t cancel. There are so many people depending upon us to earn money. They have not taken any other jobs at this time. Everyone from the DOP to the production designers had locked their dates. People like light assistants and spot boys earn per day, and that would have all gone for a toss. That is not cool. Then, the dates we had were with combinations of so many actors. These are all big actors. I can’t suddenly tell them to give me dates later. They have other big films lined up, and those directors won’t leave those dates for me. So, we took that call,” he said.
Abhishek also revealed that he knew Jaideep only socially before he got on the film. “His first film, Aakrosh, was produced by dad (producer Kumar Mangat Pathak). We had met a few times,” he said. He said that it wasn’t easy for the actor to take up the role at such last minute. “To come at the last minute and blend into the character is something. It wasn’t as if he had six months to prepare and do workshops. He had a few days. We did two readings before I left for my shoot, and then he came 1-2 days before his shoot was supposed to start. He asked a few questions and read the script. He had a look test in Mumbai. We both leaned on each other because it was all so last-minute. For him, it was a challenge entering a journey he wasn’t a part of earlier. For him to come and become a part of the film was challenging, but he did it beautifully.”
Jaideep’s intro scene was shot in Goa and later reshot in Mumbai because Abhishek felt it wasn’t landing well. “It was last-minute writing, and I felt it could be better.” The filmmaker says Jaideep gave him the space to take these calls.
“That last-minute pressure made the character beautiful. When you are under pressure, particularly for a franchise like Drishyam, where you have to meet certain benchmarks, it was a challenge,” the filmmaker added.
Drishyam 3 titled Drishyam: The Conclusion is the final segment in the film franchise. Directed by Abhishek Pathak, the film has Ajay Devgn, Shriya Saran, Tabu, and Rajat Kapoor reprising their roles. Jaideep is the new entrant to the franchise and plays Crime Branch officer Rajveer Tomar in the film, who is tasked with framing a case against the Salgaonkar family.
