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Anupam Kher on Acting

Disappointment, disturbance of the mind, depression, disillusionment, disenchantment and near disintegration of the self is what I have discovered in most of the strugglers I have met during the 15 years I’ve been around. It is a very painful experience talking to them but talk I must, I realise, if I have to know more about them, more about their physical and mental conflicts, their pangs and pains they go through, the harrasment and the humiliation they have to heave through if they have to try to reach their goal.

This week I give you three stories of three strugglers that will rend your heart into two... if you have one left.

Suresh Upadhyay is the first struggler I meet at Essel Studios. He is wearing a purple coloured pant, a pink shirt and battered white shoes (it seems like he has done a lot of walking around). He is trying his best to comb his hair like Shah Rukh Khan because he wants to be a hero like Shah Rukh bhai, no one else. He has come to Mumbai with just one intention - to make it as an another Shah Rukh Khan. He knows all the songs and important dialogues of the films of Shah Rukh bhai and hopes to speak like him on the screen one day. He is sure he will make it as a hero because the actor in him says “actor ki awaaz pukaar pukaar ke kehti hai ki tu ek din Shah Rukh Khan se bhi aage badega”.

Every word is spoken like Shah Rukh, even the famous Shah Rukh stammer is very much there in that one line. He was a carpenter in Surat but he didn’t want to be a carpenter all his life. He wanted to be Shah Rukh Khan. “My family wanted me to stay back. His friends said, “haar jaayega, mar jaayega, bhaag jaayega.” But he was not one of those who give up easily. All he needed was an entry into a studio where he could meet people and show them their talent. He was lucky he got himself a job in the canteen at RK Studios but his luck was bad.

RK Studios was no longer what it was. They were only shooting TV serials there and he didn’t want to act in serials (as if all the serial makers were dying to cast him). The big filmmakers were no longer shooting in RK Studios for reasons of their own and the canteen owner was not willing to keep Suresh because of his great ambition to become Shah Rukh Khan. He left RK and then joined a canteen of Nataraj and Filmistan Studios. It was a desperate attempt to catch the attention of someone who could give him a break, that one chance. He didn’t want to act as Shah Rukh’s duplicate or a junior artiste. ‘Apne hi haathon se chaman kiyon bigadneka’, he asked. He kept trying. He spent all the money he had earned on the colourful clothes and shoes he wore. Till one day he realised there were no clothes and no money. He made do with second hand clothes and shoes. He still didn’t give up. He took up a job as a domestic help in a well-known director’s house. It was not so much the job he wanted but the contacts which by now he had realised was so very important if you have to make it in films.

Thereafter he worked in several homes of “directors only” because he felt they were the only people who could ‘make’ him, but nothing happened. Suresh’s taqdeer was not on his side. The last time I met him at Mehboob Studios. “Khunnas hi ho jaati hai” he says with anger but still says he will not give up.

Rohini from Hooghly saw all kinds of her dreams flow down the “gutters of Worli” when a so-called “male friend” called her to Mumbai with the hope to make it as a heroine and cheated her to her last paisa. Rohini is a ruined woman today, all pomp and splendour outside, with a skeleton of conscience within. She is the “madam” of a house where she lures a number of other girls like she was lured once many years ago.

There are times when I meet atleast seven or eight strugglers in a day and by the time I am about to go to bed and if I have the time to think of them I know that my soul bleeds because I too was a struggler once, a struggler who got away - fortunately, very fortunately.

PD Shenoy, Shimoga
What are the basic academic qualifications required to be a good actor?

Frankly, nothing. Some of the greatest actors of the past were illiterate and semi illiterate and came up with some of the most brilliant performances. But knowledge, a reasonably good education always helps. You understand life better. If you ask me in today’s time education, reading more than just education is a must, a “weapon” which can be of great use in any profession in life. I devour “atleast seven or eight major works of literature every month inspite of my hectic work in different spheres”.

Sam Ferns, Mumbai
Why can’t these Hindi filmmakers try actors who can speak correct English when they need a character to speak English? Why you hanaar (Your Honour) when it comes to an advocate addressing a judge and I can give you any number of examples?

A very tricky question. You see generally the actors who are chosen to speak lines like ‘your hanaar’ or “pliss have a shit” are actors who don’t know a word of English. They have to mug their lines. They mug them and do it because if they don’t do it there will always be someone else to do it. The director generally cannot go for English knowing actors because he has to choose junior artistes from the Junior Artistes Association. You must see them, know them, talk to them and you will never ask such a question again.

Danny Mehta, London
The actors and actresses of today pay no attention at all to language and diction. Why is such a mortal sin allowed for an actor who I’m told charges crores. Shouldn’t he be more fluent in the language which is the life of a film?

These days most of the young actors/actresses come from English speaking homes. They have to be forgiven for not knowing perfect Hindi they think. Or punish them by not giving them any work. Their directors who tolerate their language too should not be forgiven. We are making Hindi films, not Hinglish films. Once this Hinglish speaking actor/actresses get busy they just don’t have the passion, time or interest to improve on their language. There are times when they shoot three films a day. How do you expect them to do justice to anything where ‘small’ things like aesthetics, quality, diction or sincerity is concerned.

Kundan Kumar, Jaipur
What is more difficult - acting in theatre or acting in films?

Acting in theatre, undoubtedly. You should see some of our performers in theatre and the work they come up with and compare what our actors in films do. But the unfortunate fact is that the greatest performer in Hindi theatre is doing what a small-time actor or actress is supposed to do in films. It is shocking. If you ask me it is these actors who have kept theatre alive for years who deserve all the crores, the praise and the prosperity. They WORK for it. They live for it. They die for it.

Joy Banerji, Mumbai
I dare not compare myself with the late Kishore Kumar but I know that I too can prove to be an allrounder like him.

Keep trying. When Kishore Kumar first came to Bombay from Khandwa, his brother, Ashok Kumar, immediately asked him to go back home because he knew how difficult it was to find work here. But Kishore was both arrogant and eccentric when it came to his ambition. He stayed on and stayed till he had proved to his brother and to millions all over what he was, who he was. So, don’t lose hope, don’t lose faith. They are the only solutions in today’s world.

Shatabdi S., Calcutta
I can easily make it in Bengali films but I want to be one in Hindi. But I’ll be very frank with you. A very good actress friend of mine did one film in Hindi and then was called by one of the biggest, oldest, richest and famous filmmakers from Mumbai for a screen-test. The first thing he asked her was to take off her clothes.

A figure was very important for an actress to make it, he tried to convince her. My friend struggled for a while, managed to get out of the grip of the old man, bolted the door from outside and ran away never to come back to Mumbai or to films again. What must I do?

Sorry, not all men are as sex crazy and as sick as that old leech. He deserves the highest kind of punishment for ruining the good name of one of the most polished industries in the country. Exceptions there always are but not like this one. This the pits.