2 States
Love
marriages around the world are simple. Boy loves girl. Girl loves boy. They get
married. In India, there are few more steps...
Boy
loves girl. Girl loves boy. Girl’s family has to love the boy. Boy’s family has
to love the girl. Girl’s family has to love the boy’s family. Boy’s family has
to love the girl’s family.
And if
the boy and girl still love each other, they get married.
2 States is a story about a journey of one such
couple, Krish Malhotra and Ananya Swaminathan. They meet at the IIM-Ahmedabad
and during the course they fall in love. Complications arise after the course
comes to an end and they decide to get married. Krish and Ananya belong to two
different states of India. Krish, a North Indian Punjabi boy from Delhi, and
Ananya, a Tamilian Brahmin from Chennai. They take a conscious decision; till
their parents don’t agree they won’t get married. Everything goes down hill
when the parents meet. There is a cultural clash and the parents oppose the
wedding. To convert their love story into a love marriage, the couple faces a
tough battle in front of them. For its easy to fight and rebel, but much harder
to convince.
Will Krish and Ananya’s love for each other
sustain the battles? Will they manage to convince their parents and make it to
their wedding? The film thus is a
humorous take on inter community marriages in India.
CAST
Arjun
Kapoor -Krish Malhotra
Alia
Bhatt -Ananya
Swaminathan
Amrita
Singh -Kavita
Malhotra - Krish’s Mother
Revathy -Radha
- Ananya’s Mother
Shiv
Subrahmanyam -Shiv
Swaminathan - Ananya’s Father
CREW
Directed by ABHISHEK
VARMAN
Producers SAJID
NADIADWALA
KARAN JOHAR
Co Producer APOORVA
MEHTA
Director
of Photography BINOD PRADHAN
Production
Design AMRITA MAHAL NAKAI
Editor NAMRATA RAO
Associate Producer (NGEPL) RAKESH MADHOTRA
Executive Producer PRAVIN
KHAIRNAR
Supervising
Producer MARIJKE deSOUZA
Music SHANKAR EHSAAN LOY
Lyrics AMITABH BHATTACHARYA
Sound
Design ALI MERCHANT
Costume Designers MANISH
MALHOTRA
SHIRAZ SIDDIQUE
NATASCHA CHARAK & NIKITA MOHANTY
Adapted
to Screenplay by ABHISHEK VARMAN
Dialogues
by HUSSAIN DALAL
Based on the best selling novel
“2 States:
The Story of My Marriage” by CHETAN
BHAGAT
Choreographer REMO
D’SOUZA
Casting
Director NANDINI SHRIKENT
Background
Score TUBBY – PARIK
Media
Consultant HYPE
Visual
Promotions RAVI PADDA & BINNY PADDA
Publicity
Design MARCHING ANTS
KRISH
MALHOTRA - Arjun Kapoor
A tall,
erudite, Punjabi boy next door, aware of his reality, duty and ambition yet,
lost in a distant world – as he hopes to become a writer someday. A writer,
compassionate about the world around him… a world
where he wants to make a difference with his words… without being preachy.
Raised by an overbearing Punjabi mother and an alcoholic
father, theonly reason Krish is home, is for his mother. They find the solace
of a family with each other. He would not do anything against her wishes or do
something that would hurt her.
However,
much to the chagrin of his mother, Krish falls in love with Ananya, a Tamilian
girl, whose nonchalance over his caste or community and encouragement to pursue
his dream to become a writer, wins him over.
Krish
knows his mother will not be happy with his choice of a “Madrasan” and that
Ananya’s parents will not be forthcoming either. However insurmountable the
task of overcoming the obstacles of the borders, states, communities and
cultures… he will
fight for his love… but will
he succeed?
ANANYA
SWAMINATHAN – Alia Bhatt
Intelligent, confident and beautiful, Ananya Swaminathan
is the eldest child of a middle class Tamil-Brahmin family from Chennai. Full
of ambition and youthful energy, she rejects conventional outlooks on
relationships, cultivating instead, her own unique viewpoint. She has
unwavering faith in her ideas of right and wrong and no qualms in standing up
for what she believes in.
Even though the cast, creed and community of the person
she wants to marry are immaterial to her, she holds great value in the consent
and happiness of her more traditional parents.
Ananya navigates the complex journey of falling in love
with Krish, familial opposition, the madness of an unfamiliar Punjabi family
and the imbalance between tradition and her own conviction, leading her to
question everything she has so far believed about love and marriage… and
her dreams of a life with Krish.
KAVITA MALHOTRA – Amrita Singh
A Punjabi matriarch, obsessively protective of
her son, bigoted and prejudiced but completely unaware of it. As a respite from
her abusive husband, her hopes and dreams are rested on her only son Krish that
he will marry someone from within the Punjabi community with a fat dowry she
can then boast of.She hopes this would elevate her social standing that always
gets questioned due to her estranged relationship with her husband.
The struggle between her own wish and her
unconditional love for her son’s happiness puts her in a dilemma whether to
listen to her heart or succumb to the falsity of “marriage within the
community” devoid of love that she yearns from her own.
VIKRAM MALHOTRA – Ronit Roy
A proud, reticent, retired military man,
impeccably dressed and dignified but defeated by life and failed by his own
misgivings, Vikram Malhotra struggles to balance his worsening alcohol abuse
and its strain on his relationship with his wife and son. He distances himself
from his filial duties but he quietly observes the tumultuous events unfold in
his son’s life.
RADHA SWAMINATHAN - Revathy
Tucked within the many folds of her crisp
Kanjeevaram, Radha, a quiet, inward, charming, devoted mother, smoulders with a
deep desire to fulfill her long cherished dream of being a singer. She raises
her daughter Ananya to be free-spirited, elegant and dignified, all the
qualities she herself espouses. However, she is rattled by her daughter’s wish
to marry a Punjabi lad. She knows that Ananya will never go against her wishes
but she also knows that her one wrong decision can alter the fate of her
daughter’s happiness.
SHIV SWAMINATHAN – ShivSubrahmanyam
A stoic, disgruntled at work
but content with life, a righteous Tamilian Brahmin, whose daughter Ananya, is
the apple of his eye. A look and a smile from her is enough to make him
acquiesce to all her demands, except her wish to marry Krish. Never insulting
or abusive, he tries to resist bonding with Krish, who goes out of his way to
win his future father-in-law. Would Krish’s feigned interest in Carnatic music
and a sneaked peg of whiskey be enough to strike a deal with the hard to please
Mr. Swaminathan?
