Anil Kapoor turns autistic

Being autistic is almost like the crest of being artistic. Hrithik Roshan did the autistic act with National award winning elan in Koi Mil Gaya.

And just as we heard of Shahrukh Khan turning autistic for his role as the isolated Muslim in New York in Karan Johar's My Name Is Khan, comes the news that Anil Kapoor will be seen playing an autistic character in Subhash Ghai's Yuvvraaj.

Says a source, "Anil plays elder brother to Salman Khan and Zayed Khan. Subhash Ghai had been meaning to incorporate a physically-psychologically challenged character into his script for a long time. It was Anil who told Subhashji the story idea for Yuvvraaj."

Apparently, Raj Kapoor at one time wanted to make a similar film written for him by his long-term collaborator Jainendra Jain.

Interestingly, this isn't the first time that Anil Kapoor is playing an autistic character. In K Vishwanath's Eeshwar twenty years ago, Anil was cast as a 'slow' saintly man (this was the closest we came to describing autism in those days) who wins over the village widow. Anil has self admittedly copied Raj Kapoor in Eeshwar. If sources are to be believed, Anil's reference point in Yuvvraaj is Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump.

Other screen heroes to suffer psychological disorders include Sanjeev Kumar in Anhonee and Khilona, Jeetendra in Jyoti and Amol Palekar in Solva Sawan.