Ayushmann Khurrana thought India is ready for film on homosexuality after seeing two men kiss in a mall

Actor Ayushmann Khurrana had a sweet reason for signing Shubh Mangal Zyada Savdhaan. Talking to Film Companion’s Anupama Chopra, Ayushmann said he wanted to do a film on homosexuality when he saw a romantic moment between two men.

“I was shooting for Dream Girl and I remember it was a late night shoot in one of the malls and I saw two guys kissing around 2 o’ clock in the morning. And that was the time when I was looking for something like a homosexual film, mainstream. And I was like India is ready for it. We are ready for it, we’ve not seen this ever. We haven’t seen this public display of affection by same sex in India,” he said.

Ayushmann added that he kept asking writer-director Hitesh Kewalya what idea he had in mind for Shubh Mangal Savdhaan’s sequel but he won’t tell him. When he finally cornered him, Kewalya revealed that he wanted to address homosexuality with the next film. “That’s it! I need this film right now. I asked ‘Is there a kissing scene?’ I said perfect! It should be there. There’s no other way,” Ayushmann said.

Ayushmann stars opposite Jitendra Kumar in the film as his boyfriend. The actors also shot kissing scenes for the film. Talking about it, Ayushmann said the crew made sure they were all alone when they were shooting one kiss scene on a railway station. “They emptied the whole thing. I was like I have never seen such a thing before for a normal kiss but now everything is empty. They blocked everything. The whole feel and environment was very intimidating initially,” he said.

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Ayushmann and Jitendra confessed that they had previously kissed men. While Jitendra had to do it when he was being ragged by his senior at his college, IIT Kharagpur, Ayushmann did it during a game of truth and dare on Roadies.

Hitesh added that while it was awkward in the beginning to shoot the kissing scenes, everyone got more comfortable as days went by. “They also got used to these conversations and these. That’s how you know that when you talk about it, you can normalise it,” he said.

Shubh Mangal Zyada Savdhaan also stars Neena Gupta and Gajraj Rao. It will release on February 22.

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