Whatever you do, sir, just don’t fix the money [for your next film], before calling me,” actor Shahid Kapoor told director Imtiaz Ali, in 2007, when Jab We Met (JWM) had opened “lukewarm” in theatres. ADVERTISEMENT It’s going to become a big film, Shahid suggested to Imtiaz, whispering to him then, “You could charge 2X of what you’re thinking [in lakhs], or you know what? It could even be a crore!” was set to do Love Aaj Kal (2009). Negotiations were on.
He waited it out, upon Shahid’s advice. He says, “It was Dinoo [producer Dinesh Vijan], who suffered! “You ask him, he will never forget this. He is like, ‘Sir aapne jo number bola, [the number you quoted], my head hit the roof’.
I said, blame Shahid!” Shahid had recalled to us (on Sit with Hitlist), telling Imtiaz, not to carry a script with the name Geet (working title for JWM), given the heroine’s name on it, when shopping around for the hero! But it’s actually Shahid, Imtiaz remembers now, who reminded him about the Jab We Met script, in the first place. He’d heard about it from others, while it was being passed around film industry folk. Shahid had dates available.
As did co-star Kareena Kapoor, who was going through the more important size-zero regimen for Tashan (2008), the supposed blockbuster in the making (that she explains in detail, in another episode of Sit with Hitlist). Both said yes, and Imtiaz had literally a “window of 21 days” to get on shoot, while the screenplay wasn�.