Richie Mehta is becoming Canada’s king of pitching.

The entertaining debutant writer/helmer amused a packed house with anecdotes at the Q&A following the world premiere of his Amal on Thursday, including one tale about pitching former U.S president Bill Clinton, who is thanked in the movie’s credits.

‘Bill Clinton in a room is like a hurricane,’ Mehta told the crowd. Clinton was in Toronto last year. ‘He moves with this swirl of people about him… People were pitching him about oil deals and AIDS in Africa [charities], and ‘the swirl’ stopped beside me.’

Mehta pitched Amal and asked Clinton for his email address so he could invite him to the premiere.

He didn’t get the address, but Clinton agreed to watch the movie, according to Mehta.

Mehta won Telefilm Canada’s Pitch This! contest in 2005 with Amal and pitched Indian star Naseeruddin ‘Nasir’ Shah on the streets of Bombay.

‘After pitching Bill Clinton, the pitching thing just became easier,’ quipped Mehta, who went to India with no phone number or contact to reach the star. ‘I just went to Bombay looking for him, and after 36 hours, I bumped into him on the street, and did the pitch right there. He accepted.’

Shah plays the film’s eccentric ‘homeless millionaire.’

The first-time director had one line of advice for the many crew members when they were shooting in New Delhi: ‘Just let India tell you what to do.’

‘There are times when it won’t make any sense, and that’s India,’ he advised the audience.