Rachana Dubey (BOMBAY TIMES; July 27, 2019)

Filmmaker Dinesh Vijan and director Rohit Jugraj have one thing in common - they’ve both learnt the ropes of their business by taking risks. Dinesh decided to signed Rohit to helm Arjun Patiala, a spoof comedy, after seeing one of his Punjabi films with Diljit Dosanjh. Dinesh and Rohit had a frank and fun conversation with BT about their film, which also features Kriti Sanon and Varun Sharma, and the changing face of the comedy space. Excerpts:

Comedy as a genre is gradually changing with newer sub-genres being introduced to the audience. What do both of you make of this trend?
Dinesh: Comedy is the most successful genre that we have today. David Dhawan is one of the most successful filmmakers we have in the industry, in terms of commercial success, and he understands comedy the best. So far, all of my films have had an element of humour in them. The thing is aap logon ko hansa-hansa ke kuch batayenge toh woh jaldi samjhenge. We spoke of live-in relationships with a family angle in Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s style with Luka Chuppi. That made the film accessible to everyone. Even in Arjun Patiala, the humour is such that it can be consumed by everyone.
Rohit: Punjabi cinema has some sort of hold on comedy; they do it really well. I think the audience has been ready for variety in comedy as a genre. We, as filmmakers, have taken longer to convince ourselves to try something out-of-the-box.

Dinesh, after successful films like Stree and Luka Chuppi,you decided to back a film like Arjun Patiala, which is a spoof comedy – a genre that has not been explored much in Bollywood…
Dinesh: I would say that this is the most experimental film we have made so far. While it’s out there, in a strange way, it’s also risky because we are breaking the fourth wall and talking directly to the audience. My company and I have backed films like Stree and Go Goa Gone in the past, which explored new territories. Even here, while there is a pre-existing base, the film is self-deprecating, which is quite new for the business and us. It will be interesting to see how many people this appeals to. We’ve broken the very format of narrating a film where we are saying this is a mandatory love song or an item song. We’ve turned the cop genre on its head.

Over a period of time, you’ve tapped quite a few unchartered territories, as a filmmaker, business-wise isn’t it safer to try something that’s worked in the past?
Dinesh: It’s a spoof comedy that makes fun of itself with a clear story and characters that take themselves very seriously. We haven’t made fun of any other actor or film while trying to do this because it’s not fair. For us, the real challenge was to tap those people who didn’t laugh when they saw the trailer because they didn’t quite get the humour in it. As a filmmaker, I have always experimented with my content, starting with Being Cyrus and Go Goa Gone. Badlapur was an experiment with Varun Dhawan playing such a dark character at the beginning of his career. Stree was a horror-comedy, and films like Angrezi Medium, Bala, Imtiaz Ali’s next, Roohi-Afza and Made In China are also content-driven, with an underlying layer. I’m proud of the line-up. Arjun Patiala leads the pack because it opens first. I remember, when released the trailer of Go Goa Gone, people didn’t know how to react. As a content creator, I’m only trying to gauge what can break the clutter over the next two years. I’ve never taken the audience for granted. My film is an experimental product, and I’m not shying away from that.

Self-deprecation is neither easy to depict nor easy for an audience to consume and accept…
Dinesh: I was ridiculously confident about Stree and Luka Chuppi because somewhere, I knew they would work. Go Goa Gone was an experiment, a zombie film where no one knew how the audience would react. These genres, over a period of time, develop a cult following, which takes time and effort. When writers Sandeep Leyzell and Ritesh Shah came to me with Arjun Patiala, I felt they had the right intent – they wanted to make a film that laughs at itself.

Rohit,you made your last Hindi film, Superstar,a few years ago.Between that and Arjun Patiala, you’ve made some Punjabi comedy films. Why make a comeback with a spoof comedy?
Rohit: The first Punjabi film that I made was Jatt James Bond, which was a thriller-comedy. After working in the Punjabi film industry, I realised that there could be so much variety in humour. For me, it’s a form of spirituality. I have realised that Punjabis generally tackle everything with a pinch of humour and they get past things or drive home their point well. I had gone off the radar from Hindi movies because here nobody lets you make the films you want to if your previous films have flopped. It had happened with me. When I moved to Punjabi films, I got a chance to work with top stars like Diljit Dosanjh and Gippy Grewal, and I understood a lot about stories and the numerous ways in which they could be told. About a year ago, when Dinesh and his writers told me about this film, it hit me somewhere. I was blown away with just how self-deprecating they intended it to be. Writer Ritesh Shah is known for some serious films, and I wasn’t expecting this from him. When Dinu said that we have to break the forth wall and talk to the audience, it was important to understand the four walls to know which one to break. My team had even warned me against me doing this film, but I decided to give something unique a shot.

How difficult was it to explain a film like Arjun Patiala to its actors?
Rohit: They came around fairly easily because they liked their parts; we have had a deeper discussion in this interview than we had with them (laughs!). They just had to believe in the characters and do their bit.

What do you make of the spoof comedy genre which is already quite popular in the West?
Rohit: I think films like Hot Fuzz, Scary Movie and Deadpool are quite popular. Spoof comedies from the West have been massy, and yet, very sophisticated. Their humour has grown on the audience over time. The ultimate thing in any film is its entertainment quotient. We don’t need to have a hangover of the West. If our superhero film doesn’t entertain, the audience will question it. The reason people are more accepting of what they see in Hollywood films is because they say things convincingly and in an entertaining manner. In our spoof comedy, we’ve not aped anything from any existing film. We have done our own thing, and if it entertains, irrespective of whether one has seen a spoof comedy before or not, people will like it.

BOMBAY TIMES (July 2, 2019)

Things are looking ‘Sunny side up’ for the makers of Arjun Patiala. The film’s new track, Crazy Habibi VS Decent Munda, which will see Sunny Leone grooving alongside Diljit Dosanjh, will be unveiled tomorrow. The peppy number, composed by Sachin-Jigar, has been written and sung by Guru Randhawa, while the Arabic vocals have been rendered by Benny Dayal.

The movie features Diljit as a policeman with many quirks, while Varun Sharma plays an overdramatic hawaldar, and Kriti Sanon essays a gutsy reporter. Talking about the high-energy track that has been choreographed by Vijan Ganguly, director Rohit Jugraj says, “The song is a crazy dance number. It's for all the crazy habibis and decent mundas. The foot-tapping track has an underlying humour to it, and is an out-and-out club number. We had a blast shooting. The most fun thing was dressing Diljit Dosanjh and Varun Sharma in crazy costumes. Sunny Leone is, of course, fabulous, like she always is. Her dance moves in the song are to watch out for.”

The actor-comedian features as a narrator in Kriti Sanon, Diljit Dosanjh’s upcoming spoof-comedy
Himesh Mankad (MUMBAI MIRROR; June 24, 2019)

The Kriti Sanon, Diljit Dosanjh and Varun Sharma-starrer spoofcomedy, Arjun Patiala, features a 1980s-style voice that narrates unusual tales from the making of a typical Hindi cop film. Mirror has learnt that after several screen tests, the makers of the Bhushan Kumar and Dinesh Vijan production got comedian actor Sunil Grover on board as the narrator.

Director Rohit Jugraj says, “We tried a couple of voices, but something was missing. We wanted someone who could imitate the vibe of the retro radio days. One day, Sunil was at the same studio as us, and upon hearing us out, got the tone we needed spot on effortlessly.”

Sunil reveals that everything fell in place “by accident”. Ask him how he managed to meet the brief without rehearsal, and the actor simply says, “I could do it, so I did it,” noting that the film is “gutsy as it showcases the other side of the world”. Would he like to act in a similar film? “Right now, there is nothing on cards, but I would love to do such a film, depending on the script.”

Rohit hails Sunil’s inclusion as “cherry on top,” and explains, “His presence just added more quirk to the comedy. Like everyone else, even I am his fan. He is making his place in Bollywood with good roles in different genres.” The filmmaker goes on to add that for the longest time, people tried in vain to guess whose voice it was. “In fact, even our cast didn’t know till we told them,” he signs off with a laugh.

Diljit Dosanjh is back in uniform, this time with Kriti Sanon and Varun Sharma, to bring on the laughs
Roshmila Bhattacharya (MUMBAI MIRROR; May 14, 2018)

The title makes you want to go ‘Balle Balle’ in a sarson ka khet but while the setting and the flavor is small town Punjab, Arjun Patiala is very much a Bollywood comic caper with Diljit Dosanjh in the titular role. “He plays a man in uniform but this cop is nothing like the one in his first Hindi film outing, Udta Punjab, who is out to bust a drug cartel. This policewallah is a laugh-a-minute character with a swagger that is all Diljit who will have you rolling with his quirky sense of humour which he has trademarked back home,” promises Dinesh Vijan, who is producing the film with Bhushan Kumar.

Varun Sharma, another actor known for his comic timing, plays Arjun’s lackey. After Fukrey’s Choocha, the actor will be seen as a cop with a sarcastic tongue and an arrogant stride, who goes by the name of Onida Singh.

Joining the duo in their efforts to bring law and disorder is Kriti Sanon, who after Bareily Ki Barfi’s chirpy Bitti Mishra, has landed another desi girl role. Its love-at-first-sight as Arjun finds his match in this scoop-hungry crime reporter with a TV channel. The trio has a baddie to contend with as Zeeshan Quadri steps out of his ‘good friend’ avatar to roam the campus, his hair tied up in a patka, piling up the corpses without batting an eyelid. His character is called School, pronounced in the Punjabi way as Sakool.

“The Rohit Jugraj-directed laugh riot offers plenty of action and dollops of bubble-gum romance. We believe in doing something different every time, and since we have never attempted an out-and-out comedy before, we decided to experiment with one which is more situational than slapstick. If this film works, we would be happy to spin a franchise with Arjun, Onida and Ritu returning as the principal players. We already have an idea for Part 2 and like Golmaal and Fukrey, Arjun will be back with a Patiala peg every couple of years,” informs Dinesh.

The film which has just wrapped up after an extended schedule in Chandigarh and a last-leg shoot in Mumbai, is scheduled to hit the theatres on September 13. “Who says Friday the 13th is only good for horror?” asks Dinesh. “We’ll prove that it can be a good day for laughs too.”

Sanyukta Iyer (MUMBAI MIRROR; June 6, 2016)

Subhash K Jha (DNA; August 21, 2015)

Sons Of Sardaar, which is based on the legendary Battle of Saragarhi, was originally supposed to be made with Sanjay Dutt in the lead. But the actor’s incarceration has compelled the makers to go ahead with Dutt’s buddy Ajay Devgn.

Says a source, “The film was originally supposed to be produced by Dutt’s friend Bunty Walia and directed by Rohit Jugraj, who the actor felt, was the right person for a war epic. But then, Dutt went to jail and rather than wait for Dutt’s release, it was felt that Devgn was the right person for the part.”

Apparently the role requires the protagonist to be fighting-fit. “It would’ve taken Sanjay Dutt months and months of physical training to get into shape for this role. It was therefore felt it was better to replace Dutt with Devgn,” says the source.