Hansal Mehta is one of the most interesting storytellers in Bollywood right now. With names like Scam 1992, Shahid and Aligarh under his name, Mehta has emerged as a popular director in the industry. Recently he spoke about his rapport with Manoj Bajpayee with whom he did the 2000 film Dil Pe Mat Le Yaar!!. Recalling its shoot, he said that Manoj was a ‘pain.’
Hansal Mehta talks about Manoj Bajpayee
Hansal Mehta was a part of the recently held year-end roundtable of Cinema Express. During the conversation, Mehta said that he enjoys working with actors he is comfortable with and they don’t need to be effusive to impress him as its about the ‘connection’ one feels. He then started talking about what it was like working with Manoj Bajpayee for his 2000 comedy-drama film Dil Pe Mat Le Yarr!!. The director said that Manoj had ‘major mood swings’ around that time.
He said, “Manoj has major mood swings. We made Dil Pe Mat Le Yaar!! in 2000, and he was a pain in that film.” However, Mehta further clarified that Manoj is a nice guy at heart. “But at heart, he’s a nice guy. He’s not a bad person. You get that vibe. When we were working together, I used to get very irritated. I would ask, ‘Manoj, why are you behaving like this?’ That was the time when Manoj would take the character and just go. I don’t know how he decided that the character should be irritable, but he thrust it on everyone. Everyone used to run away from him”, he added.
Mehta also recalled how Saurabh Shukla told him that Manoj was mean to him.
About Dil Pe Mat Le Yaar!!
Dil Pe Mat Le Yaar!! is directed by Hansal Mehta and written by him along with Saurabh Shukla. The film stars Manoj Bajpayee, Tabu, Saurabh Shukla and Aditya Srivastava. It met with mostly mixed reviews and underperformed at the box office. Mehta was even manhandled in his office due to some dialogues in the film that were deemed ‘offensive’ by some.
Years later, Manoj and Hansal collaborated on the 2015 film Aligarh which was based on the late Ramchandra Siras. Upon release, both the film and Manoj’s acting met with universal acclaim.
Hansal Mehta and Manoj Bajpayee’s work front
In 2023, Hansal directed the crime web series Scoop starring Karishma Tanna. Based on the real-life story of journalist Jigna Vora, the series met with positive reviews. He was also an executive producer on the web series Scam 2003: The Telgi Story.
Mehta has helmed the mystery thriller The Buckingham Murders starring Kareena Kapoor Khan and it also marks her foray into production. It had its world premiere at the BFI London Film Festival where it met with positive feedback. Apart from that, he has also backed a film called Dedh Bigha Zameen.
Manoj, on the other hand, received praise for his performance as an advocate in Sirf Ek Bandaa Kaafi Hai. He has also done Devashish Makhija’s Joram which premiered in December on Zee5. His acting in the latter also met with positive reviews. The actor will be next seen alongside Konkana Sensharma in Abhishek Chaubey’s crime comedy series Killer Soup. It also stars Nassar, Sayaji Shinde, and Rajeev Ravichandran. It will premiere on Netflix on January 11th this year. Manoj has also done a film called Despatch.
