Daily Times

Farhan Akhtar’s singing has always left the audience with ‘divided opinions’, according to him. During his appearance on the latest episode of Pinch, hosted by Arbaaz Khan, Farhan Akhtar addressed the attacks on his singing, the constant requests for Don 3, the evils of social media and the futility of fighting trolls, as well as the mystery behind Salim-Javed split.

Arbaaz Khan read out some unflattering comments about his singing, including one troll comparing him to ‘thousand croaking frogs’. Farhan laughed and said, “This is a part of my social service extension. I want people to stay and home and listen to me.” He also added that people have enjoyed his songs from Rock On! Atrangi Yaari with Amitabh Bachchan and Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara. “I totally understand that my voice is not a conventional playback singer’s voice. There is a certain quality of work that is associated with playback singing. My skill level or tone is not in that vicinity. So I don’t sing for other people. I absolutely enjoy it, and I am not apologetic about it at all.”

On why he selected Don from Salim-Javed films to remake, he said, “I was a big fan of Amitabh Bachchan. I got scared when I saw him in Don. I said this is my hero, and he is such a vicious, mean person. I told Zoya, that Don is such an amazing film and it would translate so well into today’s time. Zoya said, ‘I should remind you that you’re a director, why don’t you make it?” He mentioned that he wondered how to bring a fresh and new perspective to the film. Arbaaz also brought up the fact that people keep bringing up Don 3, as they’re waiting for Farhan to make the film. Farhan laughed and mentioned that they talk about Don 3 on condolence tweets. “When I’m writing deepest condolences, someone says, ‘let that go, when are you making Don 3?’ They can’t even give respect that someone has passed away, at least leave that tweet alone.” He said that he always gets abuses with the request for Don 3, which leaves him perplexed.

Arbaaz Khan read out some unflattering comments about his singing, including one troll comparing him to ‘thousand croaking frogs’

Speaking about the Salim Khan-Javed Akhtar split, Farhan said, “I find it incredible that whatever happened between Salim saab and us, it never trickled down to us. I never knew when the split happened. As years went by, I saw Salim saab wasn’t coming home and that we weren’t going over to his place.” Arbaaz added that this rift didn’t come down to him and Farhan, as they were always on good terms. Both of them came to the consensus that neither of them quite knew what went wrong with the popular writer duo, who had churned out some of the most iconic films of Bollywood.

After this, Arbaaz quizzed him on the films that the popular duo wrote together.

Pinch airs on Zee 5 weekly.