Aamir Khan's Son Junaid Was Supposed To Play The Young Tom Hanks In Papa's Forrest Gump Adaptation

Aamir Khan, who was last seen in the disastrous Thugs of Hindostan last year, is now making the official adaptation of the Tom Hanks classic Forrest Gump.  Advait Chandan. The film, which will be a co-production between Aamir’s production house and Viacom18 Motion Pictures, will be directed by Secret Superstar maker Advait Chandan.  Well, many people think that Aamir looks like Tom Hanks. In fact, he said the other day, "Yeah, I’m compared all the time. I don’t know why, because when I see Tom Hanks, I don’t see many similarities. His energy is similar to mine and his eyes are similar, so you get the feeling more than the actual face cut. You know who told me this first? Gautam Rajadhyaksha, who was a still photographer and is no more. He had done an exhibition of his photos in LA sometime in the ’90s, four or five years after I started acting. When he came back, he said almost everybody in the exhibition asked him when he shot Tom Hanks! Even then I was wondering because he’s got curly hair and looks different."

So this all is known. But what is not known is that Mr Perfectionist had thought of casting Junaid Khan in the film to play the younger Tom Hanks. Yes, you heard it right. Aamir's son Junaid who assisted Rajkumar Hirani on PK was more or less ready to don that role- until there was a change in plan at the last minute. It is not yet clear why they didn't stick to casting Junaid. Instead it was decided that Aamir only should lay the younger Tom Hanks- perhaps due to the fact that Aamir has always pulled off the younger role rather easily.


So, no Junaid in Laal Singh Chaddha, which is the working title of the film in question. 

As for how did the adaptation of Forrest Gump happen, Aamir had said, "The writer of this film is (actor) Atul Kulkarni, and it’s a strange story. When we were doing Rang De Basanti (2006) together, he asked me one day what my favourite film was. And I said Forrest Gump. Exactly two weeks later, he told me he had a script for me. He had never written anything before, so I was surprised and asked him what it was about. He didn’t tell me anything but asked me to take out time to listen to it. A month went by and then another, because I was busy. Finally, just to get me to listen to it, he revealed to me that he had adapted Forrest Gump.


Apparently, after I told him Forrest Gump was my favourite film, he came up with a screenplay in the next 10 days. And that made me want to avoid listening to it even more! (Laughs) It’s Forrest Gump, and it was Atul — I was wondering what he must have written... I just couldn’t bring myself to take him seriously! But he would keep reminding me and finally, I heard it two-and-a-half or three years later. He would keep reminding me, so finally I gave in and decided to hear his story. It blew my mind.


After I liked Atul’s adaptation, we started the process of getting the rights of the film. It’s taken us eight years to do this. Obviously we couldn’t make the film without the rights. Advait (Chandan) will be directing it and we’ll be shooting this film across Delhi, Punjab, Himachal (Pradesh) maybe, mostly locations in the north. We’re still doing recce to find locations."


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