‘Messiah’ Salman Khan offered Nikkhil Advani a job after his fallout with Karan Johar: ‘Now you will work for me’

Nikkhil Advani recalled how Salman Khan and Akshay Kumar supported him after he cut ties with Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions.

Director Nikkhil Advani started his career with Yash Raj Films and Dharma Productions, and eventually directed the Shah Rukh Khan-starrer Kal Ho Naa Ho, which is still considered to be one of the most memorable Dharma movies of that era. But soon afterwards, Nikkhil and producer Karan Johar had a falling out, resulting in them severing ties with each other. But as soon as Nikkhil stepped out of Karan’s camp, Salman Khan took him under his wing and offered to help him restart.

In a recent interview, Nikkhil shared that people suspected that he had not directed Kal Ho Naa Ho, which made him want to prove to the world that he did. Hence, he directed the multi-starrer Salaam-e-Ishq. “Salaam-e-Ishq was an outcome of arrogance that, ‘Okay, people feel that I have not directed Kal Ho Naa Ho, I’ll direct six love stories. One will be a Mani Ratnam type love story, one will be a Gulzar type, one will be Karan Johar type, one will be a Kundan Shah type’. So, I said I will direct six love stories. Sunil Manchanda (producer) gave me the option. He said, ‘Let’s make something like Love Actually’,” Nikkhil shared with Galatta Plus. The film starred Salman Khan and Priyanka Chopra, along with John Abraham, Vidya Balan, Govinda, Anil Kapoor, Juhi Chawla, and Akshaye Khanna, among others.

Recalling Salman’s support, Nikkhil said, “Salman Khan prides himself on being the messiah of the industry, so the minute I walked out of the doors of Dharma Productions, I got a call from Salman saying, ‘Come and meet me’. (He then said) ‘Now you will work for me, you will make a film for me’. And I appreciate that.” Nikkhil explained that this was also why he directed Sooraj Pancholi’s Hero years later. “I did Hero because Salman called me up, even after I started D-Day. After D-Day, the next film I did was Hero. Hero and Katti Batti were two big flops, one week after another,” he recalled.

Nikkhil was on a different trajectory, making films like Salaam-e-Ishq, Chandni Chowk to China, and Patiala House. But none of them worked, and soon, Nikkhil went in a different, more grounded direction, with D-Day. He said that “failure” was the reason behind changing the kind of films he was making. “It was just failure after failure,” he said.

Nikkhil said that after Salaam-e-Ishq flopped, he got a call from Rohan Sippy to make Chandni Chowk to China. He jumped on the opportunity even though he wasn’t familiar with the milieu of the film. The film, starring Akshay Kumar and Deepika Padukone, was released in 2009. By then, he had become friends with Akshay Kumar and the actor offered to do his next film. “Akshay called me and said, ‘What are you doing next? I am doing your next film. I love your energy. We got it wrong but we’ll get it right’. We started doing Patiala House. Beautiful film, lovely father-son story, Akshay had four flops, one of them being Tees Maar Khan. Nobody came to watch Patiala House. Today, when it plays on satellite, Akshay calls me up and says ‘Kya picture banayi hai (what a movie)!’” he shared.

Nikkhil is now looking forward to the release of his next film, Vedaa, starring John Abraham and Sharvari. The director is also looking forward to his next web series, Freedom at Midnight, which will stream on SonyLIV.