Lekar Hum Deewana Dil: Story of crazy, stupid love

Jointly produced by Saif Ali Khan, Dinesh Vijan and Sunil Lulla, the film also marks the directorial debut of Imtiaz Ali’s brother Arif Ali.

Kareena Kapoor, Karishma Kapoor, Armaan Jain, Deeksha Seth and Karan Johar at the music launch of Lekar Hum Deewana Dil

The legendary Raj Kapoor’s grandson Armaan Jain makes his debut this weekend along with co-star Deeksha Seth in Lekar Hum Deewana Dil, a film about a young, adventurous and immature couple in love. Here the duo share with City Times their excitement about the new chapter in their lives

Following in the footsteps of his illustrious cousins Karishma, Kareena and Ranbir Kapoor, comes 23-year-old Armaan Jain. The grandson of legendary Indian actor, producer and director Raj Kapoor, Armaan is the son of Reema (Randhir, Ritu, Rishi and Rajiv’s sibling) and Manoj Jain. With the release of Lekar Hum Dewaana Dil this weekend, Armaan joins the Kapoor brigade and hopefully will be counted among Bollywood’s Gen Next stars which boasts of the likes of Arjun Kapoor, Alia Bhatt, Shraddha Kapoor and Tiger Shroff.

Jointly produced by Saif Ali Khan, Dinesh Vijan and Sunil Lulla, the film also marks the directorial debut of Imtiaz Ali’s brother Arif Ali.

“I was not nervous before but now that everyone is asking me, maybe I am,” Arman admitted when City Times caught up with him over the phone in Mumbai. “I know that I want to keep bettering myself. The rest is destiny. What I feel can be called pressure or comfort because the end result will depend on how we made the film.”

Coming from a ‘filmi’ background, is Bollywood a constant talking point in the family? “At home, we do not talk about movies at all. Ours is a close knit family and everyone is so involved in their work, that when we come back home, we just want to talk about food and other external affairs. We always come back home to fresh topics,” reveals Armaan.

The debutant takes us through his “normal” childhood. “My upbringing was very normal. I did not grow up on too many films. In fact, it was the opposite. It was school, home and lots of sports for me. As a child, I used to wake up in the morning, listen to the stock market news with my father. But I always wanted to entertain people, make them laugh and smile. After seeing my grandfather’s film, I used to feel the itch to work in movies and my mother used to say: ‘Nothing doing. Just study right now.’”

Following school, Armaan went to London to study business and economics (following in his father’s footsteps) but he wanted to widen his horizons towards movies. “After a year in London, I realised that I was wasting my time and my father’s money and felt that I should come back to India and face the reality. I was hungry to learn the craft of movies.”

Eventually after coming back to Mumbai, Karan Johar gave him a break as an assistant director. During his three year stint with Dharma, Armaan worked on My Name is Khan (2010), Student of the Year (2012) and Ek Main Aur Ek Tu (2012).

DESTINY’S CHILD

While Armaan was busy figuring out his life, his co-star from Lekar Hum Deewana Dil, Deeksha Seth, was enjoying the path that destiny was creating for her.

During her first year at college in 2009, she was spotted by a Miss India contest scout who persuaded her to participate in the beauty pageant. Then during a modelling assignment in Hyderabad, the casting director of a Telugu film spotted her and signed her on, following which she did six Telegu films before landing the lead role in Lekar Hum Deewana Dil.

The girl who believes her life has been a series of unexpected events explains, “In Om Shanti Om (2007), Shah Rukh Khan says when you really want something the entire universe conspires so that you achieve it. I think my destiny actually found me. That’s my journey; it’s been one event after the other that led me to where I am. I am grateful for that.”

So how was it, getting mentored by Imtiaz Ali and Saif Ali Khan? ”Yes, Saif and Imtiaz were like mentors to us. Saif, our producer, is a full-fledged actor; he was shooting in America for Happy Ending but Imtiaz used to often come to our set. He was warm and would tell us, “You have my number, call me whenever you need me.” When I was dubbing and had some doubt, I messaged him saying, “Sir, I have some doubt.” He replied, “Okay. I want to come and meet you.” He came and met me with Arif sir. We had a session for about one and a half hours. That sort of generosity is amazing,” reveals Deeksha.

Deeksha believes that she and Armaan are in the same boat right now. They share the same fear and enthusiasm. “We, organically, even before we realised it, became friends.”

Now that the film industry is becoming truly diverse, younger audiencs are embracing movies that has characters that they can relate to, which was not the case a few years back. Talking about her character, the twenty-four-year old actress says, “She is funky, full of life and very relatable. There have been some scenes where I was asked to go back to my vanity van and remove my make-up. My character does not want to get married in her twenties. She wants to live life her way. She then elopes with Armaan and gets married to him. While we were shooting, one of our crew member actually eloped and got married to the love of his life. This generation loves and respects their family but want to live life their way.”

She adds, “Honestly I haven’t, in a long time, seen a debutant get a character-driven role. They are either in a glamorous role or lost in an ensemble cast.”

The movie, Armaan says, was without a title for a long time. “We went through various names. We even joked around saying, ‘Whoever gets the title of the film, will get a bonus’,” says Armaan. “No one could come up with a concrete name. During a casual meet it was Karan Johar who came up with Lekar Hum Deewana Dil. We jumped in and that title worked for us. When Neetu Aunty heard about it, she was very happy.” Lekar Hum Deewana Dil is a famous song featured on Armaan’s aunt Neetu Kapoor (Ranbir Kapoor’s mother) in her film Yaadon Ki Baaraat (1973).