Prime Time
Whose medium is it anyway?

If Amitabh Bachchan, Ajay Devgan or Shatrughan Sinha were to come and perform on television, they would go on performing week after week tirelessly and would still not be able to extort as much as they could from a single endeavour in films. But if they were to anchor a programme, they could go back with thick pockets bursting at the seams

Time and again television is spoken of as a writer’s medium. To an extent I accede to the statement but do not confirm it. There is no ambiguity, when it comes to calling cinema a director’s medium or theatre an actors medium. Once the curtains are up it depends upon the actor to execute the playwrights mind. The stage is at the actor’s disposal. Shakespeare has died a thousands deaths at the hands of poor actors many a times.

There have been many films, which could not boast of either a good story or dynamic actors but still it did well because of the way it had been executed by the director. But when we talk of television as a writer’s medium we are not vindicating the statement. Definitely, a writer is the most important part. He is pivotal to the television medium. It cannot budge an inch without him. It is like sitting with a blank book in your hands and expecting to read a bestseller. Yet a lot still remains of the medium, which is beyond the control of a writer.

He presents to the world a wide range of different characters, creates them at the tip of his pen and makes them move at the whims and fancies of his mind. But there is a point when he becomes a puppet at the hands of those very characters. People start appreciating the character portrayed on television, and start relating to it in some way or the other. Generally what happens is that the actor laps up the popularity and love showered upon the character by the audiences as his own! He misinterprets the whole adulation. In most of the cases it is seen that if an actor doing a certain a character is changed it does not affect the popularity of the serial a least bit. Whether it’s the Bold and the Beautiful or any other serial.

What do we conclude from this? To whom does this medium belong? To the actor, director or to the writer? What actually reigns the medium is the programme that’s on air. Once off air, it dies an instant death. The actors, the characters, the director and the writer, everyone are without procrastination put into oblivion. This is one of the major reasons why television, although new to India but an old phenomenon in many other countries, hasn’t gifted a single legend. On the other hand, cinema and theatre can boast of quite a few.

I know when I say this, you may think I have ignored names like Jay Leno and Oprah Winfrey from the television world. They are legends indeed, and in the truest sense of the word. But they have not been made by this medium. They are legends for what they are as individuals. Television has been instrumental only in bringing them forth to their audiences, who like them for being themselves.

They are anchors. They run the show and steal the show and it’s a coincidence that they happen to be on the television. No doubt the medium aids in the widespread popularity of these anchors, by taking them to every nook and corner of the world, which a radio or a stage would have deprived them. These legends are not a gift of the television, which is just a means to them. Unlike the actors in a serial they cannot be replaced. The show goes phut the moment this happens.

This applies to comedians as well. Shekhar Suman, Satish Shah, Javed Jaffery, Rakesh Bedi and Tikoo Talsania are not what they are because of television but by the means of television. They are not a tool in the hands of the character they play. Their presence renders everything inconsequential, even the character itself.

When we talk of payments, it is in proportion to the indispensability of the performers whether he/she is an anchor, comedian or an actor. This is obvious when we take into account someone like Shekhar Suman or Rakesh Bedi and compare them to actors like Kanwaljeet and Benjamin Gilani in terms of payment. They cannot be matched - even if they perform equally well, or better.

Television has its economic limitations. It cannot pay its actors beyond a certain price. And that is true for its other departments as well. But when it comes to paying the anchors, it’s a different scenario altogether. Anchors are paid exorbitantly.

If Amitabh Bachchan, Ajay Devgan or Shatrughan Sinha were to come and perform on television, they would go on performing week after week tirelessly and would still not be able to extort as much as they could from a single endeavour in films. But if they were to anchor a programme, they could go back with thick pockets bursting at the seams.

The survival of television without its anchors and comedians cannot be comprehended. Television is extremely fickle. And this can be proven by the fact that the minute the programme is off air, its thrown into oblivion. Comedians and anchorpersons are the only set of people who are exceptions. With the gift of gab, they set out to conquer the medium. And they have succeeded!

Raman Kumar