Boman Irani on making directorial debut with The Mehta Boys: ‘Creative vision was in my control’

Boman Irani

There are films that create noise over the release weekend and then fade away. Boman Irani is glad that his directorial debut, The Mehta Boys (2025), hasn't been one of them. As the father-son drama completed a year of release on February 7, the first-time director told mid-day that to him, the movie's enduring emotional connect has mattered far more than any conventional metric of success. "People keep discovering it, revisiting it, and talking about how it resonated with them. That is gratifying. The film is about relationships we all recognise," he said.

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Irani not only helmed The Mehta Boys, but also played the aged father trying to fix his strained relationship with his son, essayed by Avinash Tiwary. Was going behind the camera a radical shift from facing it? "The biggest difference was that for the first time, the creative vision - the tonality, framing, and visual language - was in my control," he reflected.

Now, he is back in front of the camera for Khosla Ka Ghosla 2. While Dibakar Banerjee hasn't returned to the director's chair, the original cast members have reprised their roles. "The new director is doing a fantastic job. The spirit of the story is intact," said the actor.

Is the ‘3 Idiots' sequel happening?

Boman Irani, who played the eccentric Viru Sahastrabuddhe in the 2009 comedy, said he has no concrete information, before adding, "Whatever Rajkumar Hirani [director] chooses to do, I'll be there for him."

‘The Mehta Boys' premièred at the Chicago South Asian Film Festival in September 2024