It’s been 14 years since Bollywood’s most twisted, out-of-the-box, downright diabolical comedy, Delhi Belly, was released in the theatres. The story, its treatment, the characters, and the music were all revolutionary, and the film has now gained cult classic status. Comedian Vir Das, who is still basking in the glory of his recent Netflix special, recently sat down with director Abhinay Deo and writer Akshat Verma to discuss the film and break down some of its most iconic scenes, while also discussing some anecdotes about producer Aamir Khan.
The trio sat down to discuss the hilarious apartment scene with Vijay Raaz, but before they could get to that, Vir talked about how working with Imran Khan was quite a unique experience due to the fact that his fame had broken the stratosphere after starring in Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na. He said, “He had just done Jaane Tu, and everywhere we would go to shoot the film, there would be at least 3000 girls waiting to see him. We used to share the same vanity van, so the door would open and I would come out with my bald head, and all the cheers would suddenly subdue.” They even played some behind-the-scenes shots of Imran walking towards the set with hordes of people following him.
They finally moved to the apartment scene, and director Deo revealed something quite interesting and potentially dangerous about shooting that particular sequence. They pause at the frame where Vir can be seen hung from the ceiling with a tie, as he tries to keep his balance on a long-legged stool. Deo said that this scene could have been very problematic for Vir, as during the initial few shots, he wasn’t wearing any harness. “So I pointed this out, that during the first scenes you aren’t wearing a harness. If you had lost your balance or Vijay had somehow hit the stool, well, that would have been quite a problem,” to which Vir said, “Well, I would have hung myself, and then all of you could have just said sorry.” The three men proceed to laugh it off as Verma revealed that the film was slowly getting out of their hand financially.
“I just remember that we weren’t finding a nice room for the hotel sequence, and then suddenly Aamir was like, No problem, we’ll just construct it. Then later when we weren’t able to find an apartment, Aamir said that we’ll construct that too. I just asked, ‘Aren’t our expenses increasing by too much? Where is the budget for all this? Aamir just looked at me confused, and from his expressions I could tell that he was thinking, ‘Who is this poor man on my set?’”
