Tusshar Kapoor on casting Akshay Kumar in Laxmii: We always wanted a star who has a very strong image with the masses as well as the classes

Murtuza Iqbal

Tusshar Kapoor is gearing up for the digital release of his first production venture Laxmii which stars Akshay Kumar and Kiara Advani in the lead roles. A couple of weeks ago, the makers had released the trailer of the film and then later launched the songs Burj Khalifa and Bambholle.

Recently, we interacted with Tusshar and asked him if Akshay Kumar was the first choice for the movie. To which the actor-turned-producer said, “Yes, he was always the first choice after I saw the original film. Me and my partner, we were discussing the cast, and we always wanted a star who has a very strong image with the masses as well as the classes, and somebody who will bring a lot of surprises and a lot of novelty to this very unique character because he is seen very differently.”

“So, he goes and does something so drastically different that is where people will enjoy the fact that there’s a huge change that has happened in this movie in regards to the actor’s image. There’s something fresh which is very much in the new light as far as the actor’s previous films are concerned. And that shock, that surprise, that novelty, I thought would be the USP of the film," he added.

Laxmii was earlier tiled Laxmmi Bomb, but a few days ago, the makers changed the title of the film. The movie was facing a backlash on social media because people felt that the title was hurting their religious sentiments.

When we asked Tusshar if the reason behind changing the title is the backlash on social media, he said, “I haven’t really focused on the backlash because people were only praising the trailer and the song. So, I didn’t really get to know about the backlash, and even if there is, I usually keep that away from my life because everything and anything, we have a good and bad side to it nowadays, because there are so many opinions. So, I didn’t really focus on that, but all the officials in the censor board had a very healthy conversation with us and all of us together took a call to title it Laxmii, to put to rest any controversy, if there is any. But this was a conscious decision.”

Directed by Raghava Lawrence, Laxmii is slated to start streaming on Disney+ Hotstar on 9^th November 2020.