British actor Paul Blackthorne recalled receiving an unexpected piece of advice from Aamir Khan before shooting Lagaan’s iconic ‘teen guna lagaan’ scene. The Oscar-nominated classic completes 25 years on its release today. Blackthorne played Captain Andrew Russell in the film.
“I went to the washroom, and Aamir happened to walk in right next to me. He looked at me and said, ‘Oh, Paul. This is a very important scene. The most important scene in the film,” Blackthorne told Hindustan Times.
“I just froze and thought, ‘Oh, God!’ I turned to him and said, ‘Absolutely, sir. I will be doing my best. All right, let’s wash our hands and get on with it,” Blackthorne added.
Remembering his time on set, Blackthorne said cricket proved more challenging than expected, even though he initially believed his British background would give him an edge.
“Then we arrived on set, and Aamir put on a friendly cricket match for the cast for a bit of fun. I walked up to the crease and was out on the very first ball. Aamir kindly said, ‘Oh, no. Go on, try again.’”
“I took my stance, and I was out on the next first ball! Aamir looked at me very seriously and said, ‘Maybe we could do a little work on your cricket at lunchtime,’” he further shared.
Blackthorne added that he devoted every lunch break to practice sessions.
“Fortunately, through the absolute power of editing, I was able to get away with it in the movie,” he said.
“When you see a big, fast, thunderous bowler coming down on screen and Captain Russell smashing it, in reality, there was someone standing right in front of me during the shoot just gently tossing the ball, going, ‘Okay, try and hit this one, Paul.’ And I’d miss again! I definitely wouldn’t want to do the stage version,” Blackthorne added.
Set in colonial India, Lagaan revolves around a high-stakes cricket match between a group of untrained villagers and their British rulers. It was nominated in the Best Foreign Language category at the 74th Academy Awards. It also went on to win eight awards, including the Best Popular Film award at the 49th National Film Awards.
The film featured an ensemble cast including Aamir Khan, Gracy Singh, British actors Rachel Shelley and Paul Blackthorne, Suhasini Mulay, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, and Rajendra Gupta, among others.
Lagaan was re-released in the Indian theatres on June 12.