Sunny Deol: Between Gadar and Gadar 2, I had a struggle period of 20 years

Throughout his masterclass at IFFI – titled ‘No If, No But, Only Jatt’ – Sunny Deol kept tearing up while hearing his directors – Rahul Rawail, Raj Kumar Santoshi and Anil Sharma – talk about him. The directors shared, “Sunny is too emotional, even during the filming of films like Gadar, Ghayal, Arjun and several others, he’d become pretty emotional and cry a lot after filming certain scenes.”

'I'd stopped believing'
“In 2000, after Gadar came out, a struggle period started for me because nobody was coming to me with good scripts. Pata nahi kyun nahi mil rahi thi, but between Gadar and Gadar 2 there is a gap of 20 years and while I did a couple of films in between, it was not that impactful. Lekin Gadar 2 ke baad jo khushi mili, jiske wajah se aaj kal main itna emotional ho jata hoon… because I stopped believing in things (in the last 20 years). Lekin maine kabhi haar nahi maani. Main hamesha aage badhta raha hoon.”

Talking about the type of films he wanted to do, Sunny said, “When I joined the industry, I was clear that I don’t want to do formula films. I was fortunate that when I joined the industry I got to do the kind of films that I wanted. Shuru mein main nahi chah raha tha ki main papa, Amit ji aur Mithun ji jaise filmein karoon. Unka cinema alag tha. Baad mein maine uss tarah ki filmein bhi ki hai. I joined films because I wanted to become an actor, main actor banna chahta tha. Mere andar ye nahi tha ki main star banoon. Maine papa ki filmein dekhi hain, main uss variety ki film karna chahta tha.”
At the session, all three directors shared their experience of working with Sunny and pointed out that they saw that vulnerability of Dharmendra in Sunny and decided to approach him for films.

Raj Kumar Santoshi, who directed Sunny in films like Ghayal (1990), Damini (1993) and Ghatak (1996), remarked, “Sunny is like Dharmendra - a combination of strength and vulnerability. He never interferes with his director. He will keep giving takes jab tak puri unit satisfy na ho jaye. Sunny ke andar ek khwahish hai to excel. Mera manna hai ki industry ne insaaf nahi kiya Sunny ke saath.”

Rahul Rawail, who worked with Sunny in many films including Arjun (1985) and Arjun Pandit (1999), said, “What I noticed in Sunny is that when it comes to films, he never says no to anything. In Betaab (1983), there is a scene when Sunny’s character slides below a horse carriage and after giving one shot, the duplicate refused to do it as he was too scared. And then Sunny was like, ‘I will do it, Rahul. don’t worry about the shot.’ And he did it quite smoothly.”

Anil Sharma, who directed Gadar (2001) and Gadar 2 (2023), said, “When I approached Sunny for Gadar 2, he was quite reluctant. Anyone else would have happily agreed, but convincing him was very difficult. He wanted to do it right for the audience as he didn’t want to ruin the legacy of the first film. Now, we are making Gadar 3.” Sunny revealed that he initially didn’t agree to Gadar 2 because, for him, it was a lesson learned from making Ghayal Once Again.