Veteran lyricist Javed Akhtar opens up about a possible reunion with veteran screenwriter Salim Khan. The two were present at the trailer launch of ‘Angry Young Men’. Javed Akhtar and Salim Khan were a hit screenwriter duo in the 70s and 80s.

Speaking to the audience at the launch of the show, Javed Akhtar said, “Now let me tell you that we are going to write now. I have spoken to him (Salim).” Our value was high even in those times, it must be very high in this era. Just look at that (Our prices were high at that time, so they would be high even today. You should keep this in mind).”

Later, Javed Akhtar spoke about the formation of the famous Salim-Javed duo and the magic they created together. He said, “We never decided that we will work together now. We never consciously decided that we will work together now, it grew on its own. It just happened. Incidentally, the first job I got, I got Rs 50 for it. Then I increased my fee to Rs 100 for ‘Sarhadi Lootera’ (1966). It became one of the most important films of my career because it was here that I met Salim sahab.”

Akhtar further said, “He was the romantic lead in that film and I was writing dialogues for it. During that time, the director and producer of the film harassed me a lot. But it was Salim sahab who motivated me to write continuously. He said if you can write so well for a film like this, you will write even better for even better films. After that, I shifted to Bandra and started living with a friend. He used to pay the rent. This was the time when I started going to Salim sahab’s house because at least one meal was fixed for me. We used to sit and write stories.”

He also added, “At the same time, (filmmaker) SM Sagar sahab, who made ‘Sarhadi Lootera’ and introduced us, told us there was a story and asked us to write a screenplay for it. We agreed and asked him how much he would pay us for it. He said he would pay us Rs 5000 for it. My heart skipped a beat when I heard that. We both wrote the screenplay for it, we even did ghostwriting for it.”

“There we met a gentleman who knew that we had written the script of that film, and he asked us to go to Sippy Films. We were not sure about going there because we didn’t know how they would react. But then one afternoon, we had nothing much to do and yet we decided to go to Sippy Films. There, we met Rajesh Khanna, and he asked us to write the script of ‘Haathi Mere Saathi’. There was no particular day when we decided that today we will start working together to become partners. We just kept growing. That’s how it happened. Then you all know, the rest is history,” he concludes.

‘Angry Young Men’ will premiere exclusively on Prime Video on August 20. Produced by Salman Khan Films, Excel Media and Entertainment and Tiger Baby, the series is executive produced by Salma Khan, Salman Khan, Ritesh Sidhwani, Farhan Akhtar, Zoya Akhtar and Reema Kagti and marks the directorial debut of Namrata Rao.