Kartik Aaryan: Imtiaz Ali sir helped me go beyond comic timing

Kartik Aaryan with Sara Ali Khan and Imtiaz Ali

For someone functioning on bare minimum sleep, Kartik Aaryan is surprisingly high on energy when we sit down at 10 am for a long chat in the rustic-looking terrace room of Imtiaz Ali's suburban office. "It's yet to sink in that I am the leading man of an Imtiaz Ali film," gushes Aaryan, who remembers watching Saif Ali Khan and Deepika Padukone's Love Aaj Kal (2009) as a wide-eyed college boy in Mumbai.

Over a decade later, the actor finds himself reinventing the love story with Saif's daughter, Sara Ali Khan. The film could well be a sign that he has broken into the big league, but Aaryan is more ecstatic in the knowledge that he has earned an Ali film. "[After working with Ali], my thought process is completely different. I had never done such detailed research for any other film. Imtiaz sir and I sat down and delved into the back-stories of my characters [Veer and Raghu]. I went for body language classes; he taught me method acting for the first time in my career. Before this film, my expertise was comic timing. But Imtiaz sir has helped me go beyond it and widen my range."

Kartik Aaryan. Pic/ Instagram

As much as he is amused that his dialogue 'Aana toh poori tarah aana, ya toh mat aana' spawned a string of memes, the actor says the line resonated with him. "Veer and Zoe [Sara's character] are talking about things that millennials discuss in their relationships. Jai [Saif's character in the 2009 version] and Veer are far removed from each other. The latter is idealistic and passionate; the former was hosting a break-up party to feign that he doesn't care. Imtiaz's characters are irreverent and candid, and they have opened me up as an artiste. I am so much more unfiltered now."

The industry may have taken a while to recognise his talent, but Aaryan - with big-ticket films Dostana and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 in his kitty - prides himself on making it on his own without a godfather. "With the kind of films that I am a part of, I feel like I finally belong in this industry."

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