Rangeela is one of the most iconic films and it had surely changed the way we looked at female protagonists. The film completed 25 glorious years of its release and a reunion with the star cast was surely due. With Aamir Khan, Jackie Shroff, Urmila Matondkar, Ram Gopal Varma, and AR Rahman speaking to RJ Rohini for Radio Nasha, the team relived all the good memories. Aamir Khan also recalled how Ram Gopal Varma had removed a scene that showed conflict between Jackie Shroff’s character and his.
Speaking to Ram Gopal Varma, Aamir Khan said, “If you remember the original script, it had this one sequence in the second half and that is where I used to tell you that I have a problem. There was a sequence where I come to Goa where they are shooting, Kamal Jee and Mili, and she falls into the water and she starts to drown and Kamal Jee is just looking at her. He’s the closest to her but he doesn’t jump in to save her. Munna sees this, and he jumps in and saves her and then he comes up and yells at Kamal Jee that ‘What kind of a hero are you? She’s drowning and you didn’t move a muscle’. But Kamal Jee doesn’t say anything at that point but later on we realise that this is exactly how he lost his first girlfriend so that’s why he becomes paralyzed when he sees it happening for the second time to the girl he has fallen in love with. So this is the sequence that Ramu had chopped from the film and that showed the conflict between Kamal Jee and Munna. So that scene in the second half worried me a little because the conflict between them was suddenly reduced.”
To which, Ram Gopal Varma explained, “At that time, it was seeming a little out of character and I was not very sure that it will be convincing. But, let me tell you this, originally, I had planned a flashback for Jackie.” After which Aamir Khan continues and says, “The thing about Jaggu was that the girl who died, and because of which he is in depression. So that was a sequence in which you see how he lost the girl. Then your emotion that was with Munna moves to Jaggu, so as an audience you’re confused if you will be happy with the girl going with Munna or Jaggu, either way there will be heartbreak. But that is the second thing that Ram Gopal Varma removed.”
Ram Gopal Varma explained, “I had signed Suchitra to play Jaggu’s girlfriend and somehow at the last moment she did not want to do it. Because the film was completed, I decided to shoot the scene where Jackie narrates the flashback. He’s in the car with Urmila where he’s telling her about everything that happened in the past and then there’s a crash. So when we were mixing the film in Chennai, he said ‘Can I tell you something?’ and I asked him to say it, he said that ‘I don’t think this scene is going to work because the sound of the crash makes it look like there’s a crash in the back. And I was wondering why is he not looking back, so people won’t understand that it’s a flashback.’ So then I asked an art director who does not understand a single word of Hindi, and asked him to watch the scene. When I later asked him of what he thinks happened in the scene, he said that he understood that Jackie was talking about his girlfriend who died. While I was glad it worked, just to be on the safe side I added the sound of a girl laughing.”
