When Saif Ali Khan was tired of playing the commitment phobic manchild: ‘I've been married twice!'

Saif Ali Khan is among the few mainstream Hindi cinema actors who do not shy away from taking on different roles. On his birthday, we revisit what he once said about his older movies.

Actor Saif Ali Khan celebrates his 51st birthday on Monday. Through his career spanning almost three decades, Saif has worked on a large variety of movies, playing chocolate boy lovers, grimy villains and quirky gangsters. However, for a large part of his career, Saif got stuck in the role of a commitment-phobic manchild, something his critics noticed, as did he.

Saif played such characters in movies such as Kya Kehna, Hum Tum, Love Aaj Kal and Cocktail, among others. But in an interview in 2018, Saif confessed that he too was bored of such roles.

Speaking to Film Companion, Saif was asked about his opinion on Cocktail, a film that starred him as a 30-something man who did not want to marry his girlfriend, played by Deepika Padukone. Saif said that Imtiaz Ali, who wrote the film, did bring out something new in it, despite the often-seen theme. Saif said that with Agent Vinod, he tried to give a new direction to his career.

"I think I had sensed that I need to do something new, which is when I was trying to put Agent Vinod together, which didn't work out but it is a well-produced film. If it had worked, it was a good attempt for a guy who does romantic comedies to do something a little more age-appropriate. In your early 40s, you can be an R&AW agent or whatever. I don't know how many times manipulating one's fate actually worked," he said.