Anil Kapoor wasn't comfortable going shirtless for a fight scene in Nayak, shot the sequence covered in multani mitti instead

Anil Kapoor’s Nayak is seen as a Bollywood classic today but the film was a box office failure when it was first released in 2001. The evergreen action gave his best to filmmaker Shankar’s maiden Hindi project, however, he had his reservations when it came to a particular sequence in the film which he had to shoot shirtless.

The crucial scene from the film where Anil Kapoor fights off a villain covered in mud while it’s raining is now as famous as the film itself. At the time, however, Anil Kapoor had trained to get fit for the scene for seven months before it was shot in Chennai. The scene was initially planned as just a fight in the rain and Anil was asked to go shirtless for the sequence.

The actor wasn’t too comfortable shooting the scene shirtless and also refused to shave his body hair for it. While Shankar was willing to change the hero and not the scene a compromise was reached where Anil didn’t have to shave his chest hair and the sequence saw him shirtless but covered in mud.

Planned on a grand scale the scene was shot on 36 cameras simultaneously. Talking about the Nayak scene Anil had said in an interview, "I am fighting naked, covered in multani matti in the film Nayak. It was shot in Chennai. One, the multani matti couldn't have been completely clean. I got a skin reaction. On top of that we shot the scene for 10 days. Two, I had to pump up my body at regular intervals, so that I don't feel cold. Three, I had to frequently remove the multani matti completely from my body and apply it again. Remember, multani matti dries very quickly.Four, the surroundings were not conducive in terms of safety. I was surrounded by a lot of metal castings. So there was always a risk of getting hurt."

Nayak has now completed two decades since it released. The film also starred Saurabh Shukla, Paresh Rawal, Rani Mukerji and Amrish Puri in key roles.