I had grown up watching Amitabh Bachchan act. And here I was exchanging dialogues with him. For me, that was a great moment.
Watching an Amitabh Bachchan film in my village was a cinematic treat.
I have grown up watching Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, Dev Anand, Amitabh Bachchan and the likes. These are actors who have changed with time. They have no shelf-life. They have immortalised themselves because they have evolved with time.
I would not have been interested in doing just a revenge film simply because I have seen so many revenge films right from Clint Eastwood films to Amitabh Bachchan's 'Zanjeer', 'Sholay' and 'Ghayal' and various variants of them.
I'm the only composer who has scored for two-three generation of actors. Be it for Amitabh Bachchan, Abhishek Bachchan or Dharmendra, Sunny Deol or Sunil Dutt, Sanjay Dutt - I have done it all.
In Kolkata is a temple where the deity worshipped is Amitabh Bachchan. The daily aarti is performed to the chanting of the Amitabh Chaleesa. And people still ask, 'Could our mythological heroes be based on actual people who once lived?'
If I can't cast Amitabh Bachchan because he's over 65, should I cast Abhishek Bachchan instead just because he resembles him and has a similar name?
I didn't really grow up watching a lot of films. I grew up in the middle of Texas in a very rural area, so we were always outside fishing or playing a sport - we were never in front of a TV watching films.
In 2010 I had signed three big banner films with actors like Amitabh Bachchan, Tabu, Arjun Rampal. Directors like Ken Ghosh, Bela Bhansali signed me and I had got my signing amounts but those films did not take off at all.
I was never that kid who grew up in New York and was always at the arthouse watching important films. I was the kid who grew up in the Midwest where there weren't any art films, and I watched TV. And that was really the medium that affected me and that I fell in love with.
I grew up falling in love with music videos and those images: Hype Williams and Mark Romanek, David Fincher and Diane Martel and Paul Hunter, just from the video side. I grew up also watching a lot of independent films and foreign films.
I would love to work with Shah Rukh Khan, Amitabh Bachchan, Aamir Khan, Salman Khan, Abishek Bachchan and a lot more... even Imran Khan, Hrithik Roshan and Ranbir Kapoor are damn good with their acting.
Bachchan has been in the film industry over 35 years and he is the real king. There are many who are around for 15-20 years and like to call themselves king. There is only one king and he is Amitabh Bachchan
I have worked with Amitabh Bachchan and Aamir Khan but I believe that if you work hard and well enough in this industry, these are the people you end up with working with anyway.