Writer-director Raju Hirani has revealed that he had initially planned 'Lage Raho Munnabhai' with Aamir Khan playing a character who hallucinates about the father of the nation--Mahatma Gandhi.
The 44-year-old actor was very keen to team up with Hirani after watching 'Munnabhai MBBS' at a trial.
"He (Aamir) said he was keen to work with me after Munnabhai MBBS and inquired whether I was working on any script. I replied in affirmative saying I was working on one and would take a couple of months before narrating it to him," Hirani says.
"I was working on a script about a man hallucinating about Gandhiji. He had met Gandhiji in the 40s and then went into coma. This was the idea that I was developing. The story was becoming serious and then I realised what if Munnabhai met Gandhiji, the story would be light hearted," Hirani recalls.
The director decided to bring Munnabhai's character into the story but says he dreaded to inform Aamir about the change.
"Even as I was writing the script, I dreaded what to tell Aamir after his return. He inquired with me the status of the script after his return. When I went to meet him he thought I had come for a narration. I told him that I had two scripts and I feel that Munnabhai script was better. He too agreed," the director says.
"When we met again for '3 Idiots' he recalled that I had refused to work with him. I was embarrassed as I was honest with him that time," Hirani recalls.
Aamir, 44, will be seen playing a 20-year-old college student in Hirani's '3 Idiots', which is scheduled to release on December 25.
The director says he has made the film for his own sanity.
"There is no question of feeling any pressure as I had planned to break away from Munnabhai genre," Hirani says, adding that if he felt the pressure, he would have made another film on Munnabhai.
"The script as well as the cast is ready and only thing we had to do is to shoot. Breaking away from it was the most unsafe thing to do," he says.
Even if the third Munnabhai film 'Munnabhai Chale Amrika' may turn out to be a bad film, atleast a good opening is guaranteed, he adds.
Hirani got attracted to Chetan Bhagat's book 'Five Point Someone' because it is set in a college hostel.
"I could identify with the story because I too have spent my college life in a hostel. But, the book was very anecdotal in nature. There was no plot.
"I worked on the script with Abhijat Joshi and we began digging into our own lives. By the time we finished writing, we realised there was very little of the book in the script. But we will honour the commitment to Chetan and give credit that the film is inspired from his novel," Hirani says.
On the film's music, especially the popular 'All is Well' number, the director said that the songs of '3 Idiots' had an appeal beyond the film.
"The lyrics are philosophical in student language," he said.
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