Director Anees Bazmee revealed that Majnu Bhai’s famous painting in Welcome was his last-minute creation.
Anees Bazmee’s Welcome (2007) has cemented its place in Indian pop culture as a comedy classic, thanks to its quirky characters and hilarious over-the-top moments.
Whether it’s Uday Bhai’s gangster-turned-poet aspirations or Majnu Bhai’s bizarre obsession with painting, the film delivers a riot of laughs. With Akshay Kumar and Katrina Kaif leading the chaos, it packs in everything from slapstick brilliance to unforgettable one-liners.
Who can forget Majnu Bhai’s (Anil Kapoor) iconic donkey on horse painting that has transcended the screen, inspiring endless memes on social media!
In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter India, Anees Bazmee shared that he made this painting ‘last minute’ after his assistants turned up with other ‘excellent’ paintings for this scene.
The filmmaker said, “I had worked with M.F Hussain on the film Gaj Gamini (2000). He would draw horses a lot and I would just watch him. You can say, I am good at imitation. There were around nine paintings that were brought on set. The production controller told professional painters to make bad paintings, But even then, they looked good. I needed a bad one!”
Anees Bazmee recalled thinking that no one could be a worse painter than him, which led him to ask for a fresh canvas. He revealed that he began by painting a large horse and then tried to draw another one standing on top of it, but the attempt didn’t turn out well and the painting got spoiled.
“It made me laugh and I thought this would look good in the film. Majnu bhai is not a great painter. Many of my assistants told me, ‘Don’t bring this art on camera, sir, it is bad.’ I told them that if they were calling this bad, this would be humorous in the film,” he added.
Welcome follows Rajiv, a well-mannered man who unknowingly falls for Sanjana, the sister of dreaded underworld don Uday Shetty. What begins as a simple love story spirals into a hilarious clash of families, crime, and chaos. The film boasts a stellar ensemble cast including Akshay Kumar, Katrina Kaif, Nana Patekar, Anil Kapoor, Paresh Rawal, Feroz Khan, and Mallika Sherawat.
