While promoting his upcoming film Maalik, Rajkummar Rao opened up about one of the biggest what-could-have-been moments in his career. In a recent interview, the actor revealed that Gangs of Wasseypur was initially written as a showdown between his character and Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s, until major changes to the script altered the course of his role entirely.

“Wasseypur was supposed to be between me and Nawaz”
Rajkummar shared how it was Anurag Kashyap who personally called him for the film. “At that time, Wasseypur was supposed to be between me and Nawaz. The story was between these two characters,” he told Pinkvilla, recalling his excitement to play a parallel lead in the project.
He went on to share that both he and Nawazuddin Siddiqui travelled to the real Wasseypur along with writer Zeeshan Qadri to prep for the roles. “We stayed there for some time. I was recording people on my voice recorder just to get the accent and to understand the milieu. Bahot maza aaya,” he said.

“Anurag sir told me, ‘Tera role ab kuch bacha nahi hai’”
Rao then narrated how one day, while he was doing patchwork for Ragini MMS, he received a call from Anurag Kashyap asking him to visit his office. The meeting brought unexpected news. “He said, ‘Sun, script aa gayi hai but abhi tera role usme kuch bacha nahi hai, to tu dekh kya karna hai.’ He gave me the choice but said he’d love to have me in the film.”