Filmmaker Mohit Suri opened up about casting Big Girls Don't fame Aneet Padda in Saiyaara, which marked her first lead role. The film also stars Ahaan Panday, making his Bollywood debut. The director revealed that it took him four to five months to find Aneet. He also admitted it was 'scary' because he was looking for someone young, around 20 to 22 years old, who hadn't done anything cosmetically to her face or body, which he said is rare in today’s age.
Mohit Suri On Casting Aneet Padda In Saiyaara
He told Bollywood Hungama, "That was a major requirement. I didn’t expect it to be such a bigger requirement. Not only that, I needed someone who felt real, someone who hadn't something to themselves. She had done some work before, and she was brilliant at it." Further, Mohit said that Aneet is predominantly a great actor, especially for the kind of role he needed her to play.
Aneet Padda Stood Out In Auditions
"She playing a Punjabi girl from Amritsar, from a middle-class family, and she just fit right in. We often have the wrong idea of what small-town India is like, they’re actually more conventionally 'out there' than we are. She had more to share with me than I had with her. She came through a round of auditions, not that the others weren’t good, but sometimes, they were too done up," added Suri.
The director shared that Aneet had previously auditioned for some of his colleagues, including Anurag Kashyap and Kunal Deshmukh, and even YRF's casting director Shanoo Sharma had vouched for her, which is why he thought she was 'good.'
Saiyaara Box Office
The film has managed to strike a chord with the audience, and has now taken over some big-budget films of the year within just two days, with a box office collection of Rs 45 crore.
According to industry tracker Sacnilk, Saiyaara minted Rs 24 crore on its second day, aka, Saturday. The film opened with Rs 21 crore at the box office, beating the likes of Aamir Khan's Sitaare Zameen Par, Akshay Kumar's Kesari Chapter 2, and Ajay Devgn's Raid 2, among others.
