Neeraj Pandey was Mr Cool when t2 met him in room 415 at Novotel, Juhu, last week. The man behind
A Wednesday! and Special 26 explores terrorism and some unknown heroes who fight it day in and day out in Friday film Baby. A chat with the Howrah boy and
St Thomas alumnus.

What made you want to make a film like Baby?

As a director, you are looking for a story all the time… something that moves or excites you enough to want to share

with the world and of course, something that is worth two hours of the audience’s time and money. You are always chasing that one story and this one, somehow, just fit in. When the script was complete, it’s something that excited all of us. Whoever read it was as excited and pumped about the film as I was and it was good to see that I was moving in the right direction.

What were your sources to go deep into this world we have no information about?

It involved a lot of reading and much of what I had read at the time of A Wednesday! really helped in Baby. Reading, talking to people, finding the right kind of references… it was part of the script process. 

So was Baby born while you were making A Wednesday!?

No, I had no such ideas then (smiles). This came to me after I had written my novel Ghalib Danger in 2013. It’s a novel about the underworld and how one young man’s life changes drastically in the course of a day. One thing led to the other and the idea for Baby was born. The next few months were spent in researching and writing the script and getting my actors on board and in September 2014, we rolled. 

How relevant is Baby currently, given the spate of terror attacks all over the world?

Terrorism has always been there, but you are right when you say that it’s more widespread of late. In fact, what’s troubling is that most of the recent attacks have taken place in cities that have seldom been targets in the past, like Paris and Sydney. Our film focuses not only on terrorism from across the border, but also home-grown terrorism. While making the film, we were very clear that this is an issue that needs to be handled very sensitively and that no short cuts would be employed. We haven’t linked the terrorism in the film to any religion or country. It’s not an anti-Pakistani film and the very clear proof of that is that we have Pakistani actors like Rasheed Naz and Mikaal Zulfiqar in the film. 

During your research, were there any real-life cases or instances that shocked you?

Lots of them, lots of them. Some of the instances that are there in the film are chilling in today’s context, though the script was written about a year ago. Some of those things are actually happening right now in the world! The film isn’t a simple look at terrorism… it goes much deeper. 

While researching, what did you learn about the headspace of a person who puts country before everything else in life?

It’s a combination of passion and priority. It’s the ability to be very sorted in your head as to what you are and where you want to go. They have their families, but they know where their family stands when it comes to arranging their priorities. 

In Baby, the protagonist’s family life provides some context to his role of a secret agent, but was it necessary to Bollywoodise a film like this with songs? Even in Special 26, the romantic track between Akshay Kumar and Kajal Aggarwal felt unnecessary…

(Smiles) The songs that you are seeing on TV are not really there in the film, but are just being used to promote it. I am sure you know that there is something called “free play” on Indian TV where you need to put in material for your film and it gives us a lot of mileage. So, for the sake of promotion, we have put in this song and there are some lines from it in the film that have been thrown in at a critical juncture. 

Honestly, I am a huge fan of song ’n’ dance in our films… I have grown up on it. My films haven’t given me much scope to put it in, but wherever I could put in a song in my last two films without taking away from the script and the film, I have done so (smiles). 

So will we next see a song ’n’ dance film from you shot in Switzerland?

(Laughs) Absolutely, absolutely! Okay, maybe not as an excuse to go to Switzerland (smiles), but Ghalib Danger, whenever I convert it into a film, has got huge scope for music because it deals a lot with Ghalib’s poetry. Music will be a very strong component of that film. 

How important is it for you to work with people you have an established equation with like Anupam Kher and Akshay Kumar?

It’s very important because you need like-minded people to pull a project through… people who are as passionate about your film as you are and I found that in both of them. In Baby, the equation between me and Akshay only got more comfortable and we got each other better and quicker. He’s someone who is very fast with his work and that suits me because I like to shoot my films at one go and move on quickly. He’s also super fit… at his age (47), I doubt there is any other actor who can pull off the kind of action he has done in Baby. 

As far as Anupam Kher is concerned, he is an extortionist… he blackmails me into taking him in my films! (Laughs) Whenever I hand over a script to him, it’s with a P.S. saying: ‘Only if it excites you’. I have tremendous respect for him and Naseerbhai (Naseeruddin Shah) because they worked with me in my debut A Wednesday! when I was a nobody. 

After Baby, you move on to the Dhoni biopic M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story. What aspects of Dhoni’s life will you be focusing on?

Dhoni’s rise to the top of Indian and world cricket is a remarkably inspiring story. The film will focus on his early days in Ranchi, his passion to make it big and how he broke into the Indian team in the face of all odds… every aspect of the man is awe-inspiring and I feel we did good by getting Sushant Singh Rajput to play Dhoni. I can’t wait to roll (smiles). 

After Royal Bengal Tiger last year, will we see you producing more Tollywood films?

We’ll wait for the right script. We don’t have anything right now in terms of a story. I loved Royal Bengal Tiger (directed by Rajesh Ganguly) and I was very proud of the work that went into it. I want to do much more in Bengali because that’s a language I understand.