Ask Anupam
Anupam Kher on Acting

Yes, this is just the kind of story I wanted to tell all you young strugglers and hopefuls, aiming for the stars above, a story frightening, an absolutely alarming and sickening story straight from the police files. Listen to it carefully and learn, cast it aside as just another story and perish. That’s my earnest request.

The quest for young and interested talent led to a major scandal in the interiors of suburban Mumbai, a scandal one of the most sensational sex-oriented stories told in recent times. A story that shocked Mumbai out of its senses and forced a majority of them to take another look at society, the values, the principles, the practices and the frauds that are going on in this great city aiming to be one of the greatest cities in the world.

It all started with a struggling handsome male model and his accomplice and a jobless cinematographer who was willing to go to any lengths to make a living. This group generally looked out for ignorant but innocent and also in a way “intelligent” youngsters just out of their teens who were "dying" to make it as artistes. The good-looking middle-aged model would scout for these "clients" anxiously. She had her very charming ways of luring these "little" girls to her "den" where she said she promised them to end all their struggles and make it as major stars who would rule the millennium to come. She surely had a very bright imagination and the girls who I thought were symbols of the great new millennium that is going to take over the world from men proved to be the fools girls like them have always been.

This gang of three talked these girls into joining their plans to make it as stars. They told them tall stories about how they made stars and how they went through a series of problems to make unknown boys and girls, especially girls, known to the world as actresses. The gang of three then took them to different studios, never to any offices of well-known filmmakers. Their targets were mainly all those big names of the ’60s and ’70s who had no work because they couldn’t afford the crorewallas and the crorewalli stars who were ruling the world today. These retired filmmakers had all the time in the world to talk to them. They also had a good time ogling over and over again at the girls who were dying to make it as actresses. The struggling models were then asked by their "bosses" to display their talent before these great veterans. The girls showed them how well they could act. The gang said this was not what they wanted. They wanted a complete display of their body-beautiful. They talked the girls into gradually taking off their clothes because the filmmakers said it was a must to judge the "total talent" of a girl by seeing her body and her body movements. The girls were then made to show the old "foggies" their portfolios of photographs. The "foggies" were not interested. Why should they when they had seen the models alive in flesh and blood? They talked and made some lofty promises to cast them in their next film and ask them to see them again after some time when the scripts on which their writers were sitting were working in some hill station - which was one big falsehood because there were no writers and there was no writing and there was no film being made. These "foggies" had joined the group of the jobless and had very little hope to come back to the position they were in at one time. The gang then used another tactic.

They promised the girls to actually shoot with them so that they could get some practice before they could face the camera when they had to for shooting their first big film which was to be "very soon". They hired a small poky dark room in very faraway suburb of Mumbai where the only lights on were the lights needed for the work involved, the practice sessions they were going to start. They were only being used for for nude, lewd and semi-nude sexy pictures. This vulgar game went on for months. The girls were throttled to silence. They could not complain to anyone. Not even the highest authorities in the land. But the gang was a little unlucky this time. There was one girl who could not take her torture, threats, their beatings, their vulgar and sexual abuse and her gradual degeneration which was leading to her ultimate destruction. The other girls were a little scared but this girl, God knows from where she got the strength, went ahead and reached the highest police authorities. Soon the gang had some very strong "visitors" in their poky little room. They were police officers of very high ranks. They raided the place, they made the girls talk the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. The girls in a state of confusion blurted out everything that had happened with them during their stay with the gang. The gang was immediately taken into custody and charged with acts under the sexually immoral and other acts which came under one big chunk of endless trouble for the gang which covered everything that dealt with immorality, basically the misuse of sex and the hoodwinking and humiliating of girls who were under their teens.

I don’t know how the “innocent” police came to know of this act after such a long time. There are many other gangs who go out of their way not only to shoot nude and semi-nude films, photographs of girls and then blackmail and threaten them and sell those photographs to sleazy pornographic magazines in different parts of the country. Any attempts made by the girls to exp-ose them were only received with more threats and the worst of all, sexual abuse which ruined their future.

If this story doesn’t frighten the daylights out of you, my young friends, nothing can. I have done my job. I know much more than what I have and there are many others like me and even in higher places where the law is enforced but this one story is enough if you have to take care and take your next step with a great deal of caution.

Manohar Chauhan, Delhi:
I have some good photographs but some of my admirers have asked me to prepare a portfolio. What is your advice and is making a good portfolio costly? Incidentally, who are the best makers of portfolios which can really help in Mumbai today?
Yes, you need some good photographs if you have to make a good portfolio. These days every producer or director first asks for a portfolio. There are some good professional portfolio makers like Rakesh Shrestha, Ashok Salian, Jagdish Mali, Haresh Daftary, Jayesh Seth and the best of them all, Gautam Rajadhyaksha. There are many others. In fact you can go to places like Adarsh Nagar and Lokhandwala and Yari Road in the suburbs of Mumbai and you will find any number of studios and photographers who claim to be portfolio specialists but all I can say about them is that they are good, bad and indifferent. The names I have given you above are genuine, good and worth your money. The money you spend on their work will be worth it. As for your question on how to go about it there are many ways, like struggling from office to office without minding the humiliation, like finding a Godfather or a secretary or even doing theatre and impressing people with your talent. A lot, however, depends on destiny. I was very talented but I still believe that there was a part destiny played in my success story.

Suresh Giri, Kolhapur:
I want to start an acting school in the interiors of Kolhapur. I can do it, but what is your advice?
My sincere advice to you is to stop it. There have been many other acting schools in Mumbai itself and they have sent out hundreds of students who have gone away broken-hearted. Why do you want to join their group and break some more hearts. And one thing I cannot understand. You don’t know the ABC of acting (or you have not even mentioned it) and you want to start an acting school. What is this country coming to?

Ramesh Shetty, Bangalore:
The kind of actors we have today shows that the only qualities necessary to be a successful actor is to know how to sing and dance and fight. I am an expert in all these. What do you have to say?
All those actors who depend only on singing, dancing and fighting are short-time actors. Some experts even call them Friday-to-Friday actors. A really good actor has to be an all-rounder, good in everything that goes to make acting as true to life as life actually is.

lMark Machado, Goa:
Can imitation of some of the well-known actors of the past help me in making me an actor?
It can certainly help you in making you a good mimic or a comedian of sorts but it can never help you make it as an actor on your own. You can’t and will never make a mark as an actor just by imitation, mark my words.