Director Raaj Shaandilyaa says his upcoming film Vicky Vidya Ka Woh Wala Video, starring Rajkummar Rao and Triptii Dimri, has nothing to do with the Hollywood film Sex Tape. The filmmaker, best known for the Dream Girl franchise headlined by Ayushmann Khurrana, said he hasn't even seen the 2014 film featuring Jason Segel and Cameron Diaz.
Vicky Vidya... follows the titular married couple on a frantic search of a CD with a video of their wedding night, whereas Sex Tape revolves around a married couple who make a sex tape to spice up their relationship only to wake up the next morning to find that it has gone missing.
Shaandilyaa said he found out that there was a film called Sex Tape after the trailer launch of Vicky Vidya..., which is set in the 1990s.
"Someone asked me on Twitter, 'Is this film like Sex Tape? I'm like, 'There's no sex in our film'. I was told by one of our writers that in that film their video went viral on the Internet. The video in our film is made by the couple and they lose the CD because of their negligence.
"The characters and story are different. Our film has nothing to do with Sex Tape. I've not even seen Sex Tape. I didn't get inspired by it, rather I got inspired by life and the people around me," the director told PTI.
He is already working on the sequel of Vicky Vidya..., which will be set around the early days of the Internet.
"Where this film ends, we've got a sequel, which will be set 10-15 years later, when the advent of the Internet has happened. We've written the story. We will shoot this film after I make another film," he added.
The inspiration for "Vicky Vidya..." came from co-writer Yusuf Ali Khan and the work on the screenplay began back in 2018, said Shaandilyaa.
Prior commitments and the pandemic delayed the film's development.
The filmmaker said he had initially planned to make "Vicky Vidya..." before "Dream Girl 2", which released last year.
Shaandilyaa said he wanted to work with "Stree 2" star Rao for "the longest time".
"However, things happen, whenever they are destined to happen. The reason why I wanted to cast Rajkummar was because I needed a middle-class boy from a small-town city. I felt he perfectly fit the bill in terms of his body language and style." Choosing Dimri to play Vidya stemmed from the need of a fresh pairing.
"For the role of Vidya, we needed someone who had not worked with Rajkummar. He had worked with Shraddha Kapoor in 'Stree', with Janhvi Kapoor in 'Roohi' and 'Mr. & Mrs. Mahi'. We needed a fresh pair and that's when we thought of Triptii. She is a good actor. We had signed her before the release of 'Animal'," he said.
The director, who started out as a writer on the TV show Comedy Circus, said he exercises caution while penning dialogues.
"When I write, I ensure we don't talk about religion. You don't know what things could hurt people. For instance, if someone in our country loves China, he would be like how can you write the dialogue in your film, 'That China has attacked us 50 times'. It's important to take comedy lightly, not seriously," said Shaandilyaa, whose dialogue writing credits include films such as Welcome Back and Jabariya Jodi.
But why set Vicky Vidya... in the '90s? The filmmaker said he was driven by a desire to capture the essence of the CD era and its influence on society at the time.
"In those days, men would sport long hair and that's why the look of our actors in the film is that. It's not because we were inspired by Sanjay Dutt or Amitabh Bachchan. The reason why we wanted to show the era of the '90s is that at that time, CDs were the in-thing." Shaandilyaa also revealed his plans for future projects, teasing collaborations with Khurrana, Rao, Kartik Aaryan, and Varun Dhawan.
"We will make Dream Girl 3 but that's not going to be my next directorial venture. I have written about 10 scripts already. I'll direct my next film sometime in March or April, its script is ready.
"I've written more stories and any of these could fit Ayushmann, Rajkummar, Kartik and Varun. All four of them have shown interest in these ideas. These are different kinds of stories from hardcore comedy, satire, black comedy, to political drama," he said.
The film is scheduled to be released on October 11.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
