Johnny Lever says he lost a lot of work over years as heroes would feel threatened: 'My scenes would be edited'

Johnny Lever, who made headlines with his comedy skills in the 90s, is now seen less in films. In recent times, the actor appeared in only two films. Recently, he was seen in Rohit Shetty’s film Cirkus starring Ranveer Singh.

In his recent interview, he talked about why he doesn’t get much work now. He stated, “Sometimes, the heroes would feel threatened and my scenes would be edited. They used to watch how the audience would react to my scenes and feel insecure. They started asking writers to come up with comedy scenes for them, as well. The writers would start distributing comedy scenes. And my roles became smaller and smaller, which is what you’re seeing now. Comedy is gone.”

He further mentioned that comedy was given much respect when he was working actively. He has worked in more than 300 films. Earlier, in an interview, Johnny opened up about his relationship with Shah Rukh and spoke about the time when his father was undergoing surgery but he had to shoot for a comedy scene and how SRK stepped in. 

Johnny said, "There were times when I was going through some personal issues and had to film a comedy scene. One such time was when my father had to be operated on, I was a bit preoccupied with it, but I still had to shoot a comic sequence."

In an interview with Bollywood Hungama, he further added, "Now I don’t let my personal issues interfere with work, so at that time I had not told anyone about this issue. I don’t know how, but Shah Rukh Khan came into the room I was in and said he heard about my father and was inquiring about him. Here I was getting ready for a comedy scene, so I tried underplaying the issue. But he continued saying that if I needed anything I could tell him. This was during the film Badshah."

Read|Happy birthday Johnny Lever: These hilarious memes on all-time favourite comedian prove he's a legend