"When I was approached to become Sam Bahadur and when Meghna (director Meghna Gulzar) met me, she had come so thoroughly prepared that how Sam Bahadur looked, how he walked and how he was by nature, she had done a lot of work in the research. A look test was done and I met his family," says Vicky Kaushal who play Sams Maneckshaw, the legendary general and later field marshal, in the December 1 release, Sam Bahadur.
"Because to become Sam Bahadur, we had to play 20-year-old Sam Bahadur to 60-year-old Sam Bahadur while he was in the army because our film is till that point."
"There is no glimpse of my mother and father in my cinema," says Meghna Gulzar, only child of movie legends Gulzar and Rakhee.
"This is good for me because I tell only the stories that I want to tell. Earlier I used to choose the stories, but now the stories find me," Meghna adds.
"When I was working on this story, Vicky was not really in my mind because we had to show the journey from 20 years to 60 years. Because I had worked with Vicky in Raazi and I knew what a good actor he was, then we met, a lot of look tests were done, Vicky worked hard and the result is in front of you."
"I was scared," confesses Fatima Sana Shaikh, who plays then prime minister Indira Gandhi, "but the director assured me a lot and when I got to read it, I learned how the relationship between Mrs Indira Gandhi and Sam Bahadur was and how a tough soldier deals with a politician, I found this character very interesting. And I happily said yes."
Sam Bahadur releases on the same day as Ranbir Kapoor's film Animal.
