Hyderabad: In the 1960 film Mughal-E-Azam, Prithviraj Kapoor and Dilip Kumar portrayed Emperor Akbar and Salim respectively, setting a notable standard for depicting toxic father-son relationships in cinema. This dynamic has left an influential mark on Bollywood, prompting several attempts to recreate that film. When a South Indian producer decided to remake this movie, believing that a film of such magnitude needed an exceptional cast. So he thought of casting the entire Bachchan family to bring the narrative to life.
Filmmaker Mehul Kumar recently recounted an intriguing conversation he had with the south producer regarding this remake proposal. During an interview with a YouTube channel, Kumar mentioned that a prominent producer from the south reached out to him, expressing interest in remaking Mughal-E-Azam and wanting to feature Amitabh Bachchan, Jaya Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai, and Abhishek Bachchan as part of the cast. Although Kumar did not mention the producer's name, he revealed they intended to cast Amitabh Bachchan in the role of Emperor Akbar, Jaya Bachchan as Jodha Bai, Abhishek Bachchan as Salim, and Aishwarya Rai as Anarkali.
Kumar recalled, "I told them that Mughal-E-Azam can't be remade. You are making a proposal but this proposal won't fly because people will compare it with the original film. Because that one was such a historical film." Following this, the producer contacted Amitabh to convey Kumar's views, to which Amitabh said that Kumar had a valid point.