Shah Rukh asked “will you let her do this?” — Karan Johar tells how Kareena became ‘Poo’ on Koffee With Karan

“Poo” is one of Bollywood’s most popular characters. Played by Kareena Kapoor in Karan Johar’s 2001 film “Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham”, Pooja, known as “Poo”, still lives in the audience’s memory. But Shah Rukh Khan himself was not very hopeful about the character at first; seeing Kareena perform, he even put a question to Karan.

Kareena Kapoor and Saif Ali Khan were recently guests on the fourth episode of the ninth season of “Koffee With Karan”. There, Karan Johar told the story of how the “Poo” character was created.

Karan said “Poo” is actually another form of himself. He also told the story behind choosing Kareena for the role. He first saw Kareena at a party, when she was just 17 years old.

Recalling that memory, Karan said: “For no reason she was putting on quite an attitude. She was 17. I looked at her and said to myself, this is it! I think Poo is another form of me. Poo is actually me. I want Kareena in my film.”

Kareena said that while playing the character, Karan would demonstrate everything himself. In her words, in every scene she simply imitated Karan; whatever he did, she followed exactly. She said Karan even demonstrated things like picking up shoes himself.

But the film’s lead actor Shah Rukh Khan was somewhat surprised at first by Kareena’s performance. Kareena said: “At one point Shah Rukh looked at me and said to Karan, will you let her do all this?”

Karan said many people initially doubted whether audiences would accept the “Poo” character, and Shah Rukh was one of them. Karan said: “Later Shah Rukh told me, only you and Bebo (Kareena) find these things funny. In 2001, such exaggerated acting, a Gen-Z-type girl saying strange and quirky lines, was not very common.”

Karan also mentioned the scene in which “Poo” rates men with numbers. He said that after doing the scene, Kareena came to him in tears of emotion. Karan said: “After doing that scene, Kareena came to me crying and said, this is the best scene of my career. And she had been working in films for only a year then.”

Not only Shah Rukh — Kareena herself initially had doubts about the character. Karan said he had to reassure her that audiences would like it. Karan said: “I had to convince her that audiences would like the character. After watching the film, her father Randhir Kapoor told her, you are playing Johnny Lever’s character.”

Karan also said Kareena had been worried whether playing “Poo” would benefit her career at all. But after the film’s release, the situation changed. The character became so popular that Kareena was seen in similar roles in nearly eight subsequent films.

The chat also revealed that Kareena had turned down an offer to act in “Kal Ho Naa Ho”. Released in 2003 and directed by Nikhil Advani, the film was produced by Karan Johar. Karan said: “When you turned down the offer to act in ‘Kal Ho Naa Ho’, Saif looked quite disappointed. Because he was really keen to work with you.”

Kareena also received an offer for the 2008 film “Race”. Saif said the offer had been made to Kareena and the script was quite good; yet Kareena had said she would not work in any film at that time. In reply, Kareena said: “Destiny had decided something else. We fell in love while working on ‘Tashan’.” Saif and Kareena fell in love while working together on “Tashan” in 2008 and married in 2012. The couple now have two sons, Taimur and Jeh.