TBIP chronicles the life of one of India’s best known film festivals, from its inception till now, through the ups and the downs.

 

On September 25, 2013, the Mumbai Film Festival’s curtain raiser event was held at the Taj Mahal Palace at Apollo Bunder. Here, in its Crystal Room, the lineup of this year’s festival was announced. Prominent films being screened at the festival were being live-tweeted by @Mumbaifilmfest, the festival’s official twitter handle. One tweet read: “Yes it’s true. Blue Is the Warmest Colour is coming to #MAMI this October!” Blue Is the Warmest Colour won the Palme d’Or at the Festival de Cannes this May. This rather enthusiastic tweet is a fair indicator of the long distance that one of India’s best-known film fests still has to travel. Most of the world’s renowned film festivals, including the Festival de Cannes, take great pride in hosting world premieres for films. They seldom screen films that have already been screened at other festivals. “We are not competing with film festivals either in Asia or in the world,” says Srinivasan Narayanan, Director of the Mumbai Film Festival (MFF, or MAMI as it is often called, after the Mumbai Academy of Moving Image which organizes it), when asked about whether MFF matches up to other leading film festivals. “Our only competition is with ourselves.”

 

***

 

On November 24, 1997, the first MFF took off. It was hoped that Mumbai, the city that had never had an independent international film festival to call its own, despite being home to the world’s most prolific film industry, would now play host to ‘good cinema’ from world over. Prior to MFF, the only film festival in the city was the Mumbai International Film Festival (MIFF), but its focus was solely on shorts, documentaries and animation films. Also, back then, the only major film festival in the country was the International Film Festival of India (IFFI). The Kolkata International Film Festival (KFF) was only two years old, and the International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK) had only had one innings. All of these had been sponsored by the state.

 

A need was felt for a festival organized by the film industry itself. “Mumbai being the premier filmmaking center in India didn’t have its own festival. We felt an initiative to change that was required, and that’s how we started,” says MAMI trustee, Amit Khanna. So several industry veterans came together to form the Mumbai Academy of Moving Image (MAMI), a not-for-profit trust. Recalls Sudhir Nandgaonkar, former Artistic Director of MFF: “The first ever MAMI meeting was held in April 1997 at Basu Bhattacharya’s home in Carter Road, Bandra. (Filmmakers) Shyam Benegal, Amit Khanna, Kiran Shantaram, Amol Palekar, Basu Bhattacharya, Ramesh Sippy, Manmohan Shetty, and the Film Federation of India (FFI) Secretary General Supran Sen made up that original gathering. And of course, there was the Chairman, Hrishikesh Mukherjee.”

 

A decision was made to set up the Mumbai Film Festival, an event that would cater to a population starved of world cinema. Hollywood films were already popular in the city, but there was scant exposure to regional films and those from other countries. “Our objective was to change that,” states Kiran Shantaram, former MAMI trustee and Secretary.

 

In the first few years of the festival, the films screened could be roughly divided into five categories: World Cinema (films screened worldwide in the last two years), contemporary Indian films (with occasional focus on regional films), retrospectives, tributes, and the ‘focus on a country’. The ‘focus on a country’ section endeavoured to “introduce film from a country that the viewer hasn’t seen before.” This section, still there, not only screened films from countries that were usually known world over for producing renowned auteurs—such as Iran, Japan or Spain—it also screened films from countries, whose cinema most were not familiar with, such as Israel, South Africa, Serbia, Montenegro, and Palestine.

 

Like most film festivals, MFF started small and without a competition section. It showcased 65 films from 23 countries, and its main and only venue, at the outset, was the Y.B. Chavan Centre at Nariman Point. NFDC technicians were brought on board to help check prints and manage screening-related procedures.

 

Getting by on a budget of Rs. 10 lakhs, the festival barely saw 200 delegates in attendance in its first year. Despite being launched as an independent film festival, Rs. 5 lakhs, or half their budget, had been received as subsidy by the MFF from the state government. “The other 5 (lakhs) came from Mahindra & Mahindra,” says Nandgaonkar.

 

The festival had many struggles with funding for the first decade. In fact, the state didn’t contribute to the 1998 edition, and the festival had to be cancelled that year.

 

Also, Air India and Jet Airways were approached to fly down international delegates for free, but only a few tickets for domestic routes were offered. As a result, organizers had to cut down on foreign delegate invites. Kiran Shantaram runs through the list of sponsors: “In 1999, we got Rs. 20 lakhs from Indian Oil (Corporation Ltd.) and Rs. 5 lakhs from the Maharashtra Government. In 2000, Star TV gave Rs. 20 lakhs, Godrej provided Rs.10 lakhs, and the state government increased the annual subsidy from Rs. 5 to 10 lakhs. For the fourth, fifth, and sixth editions, we got Rs. 25 lakhs from Star TV. In 2005, Sahara One contributed Rs. 25 lakhs.” But the backers were still felt to be too few, and the money they pledged wasn’t substantial enough. Nandgaonkar attributes this to the fact that: “In India, corporate companies have no ‘practice’ of supporting a film festival.”

 

The budgetary concerns were especially relevant because the MAMI trustees wanted the festival to be independent in the truest sense and not kowtow to unpalatable demands from corporate giants. For instance, Pepsi had approached MAMI in 2000 with Rs. 50 lakhs but had wanted to rename the festival the ‘Pepsi Film Festival’. “Of course we declined,” says Nandgaonkar.

 

In 2006 too, the festival was about to get cancelled due to budgetary constraints, but an intervention with funds from Zee Cinema and AdlabsFilms Ltd. kept it afloat. Even then, it was in such dire straits financially, that there was no cash prize for Indian films that year.

 

All of this was further exacerbated by the fact that there was no marketing manager for the festival, who could solicit sponsors. The festival couldn’t afford one because of lack of funds. It was a vicious cycle. Then, says Nandgaonkar, “I got a call from Shyam Benegal in 2007 saying, ‘For how long will you toil to support the festival? Why don’t we go to Reliance?’”

 

Reliance had branched out into the media and entertainment business with Big Entertainment two yearsago, in 2005 (It had acquired Adlabs in July 2005). “The company became a sponsor for the festival in 2007 and 2008, contributing Rs. 1 crore in each year,” says Nandgaonkar. “It was then Tina Ambani suggested that: ‘Instead of sponsoring the festival, why don’t we take over?’”

 

In 2009, Reliance Big Entertainment officially partnered with MAMI for the 11^th edition of the Mumbai Film Festival. The impact was evident. From no cash prize for Indian films in 2006, the total cash prize in 2009 increased to Rs. 85 lakhs. The budget of the festival has since then increased, and is around Rs. 6 crore for the current year, with cash prizes worth more than Rs. 1.2 crore. Also, with the advent of Reliance and a steady source of funds from 2008 on, the festival seemed to be seeking out ways of reinventing itself, of becoming more inclusive.

 

This can be gauged from the introduction of new sections to the festival, focusing on the younger film enthusiasts of Mumbai. In 2008, MFF introduced ‘Dimensions Mumbai’—a short film competition for filmmakers from Mumbai under the age of 25. In 2009, they launched ‘Mumbai Young Critics’—a film criticism workshop for selected students from various Mumbai colleges, whose critiques got published either in the festival bulletin or the Hindustan Times Café (the festival’s media partner). A jury of young film critics was also formed to confer the ‘Mumbai Young Critics Silver Gateway Award’ upon the best film in the International Competition section. The young are an important ‘target audience’ for the festival. Says Narayanan, to emphasize how important student involvement is: “Besides other reasons (not wanting to clash dates with other major film festivals), the reason we have the festival in October is because at this time of year, schools and colleges are comparatively free, and it’s not exam time.”

 

The festival also simultaneously introduced awards and sections with more international appeal: a global ‘lifetime achievement award’ was introduced in 2008 (Costa-Gavras will be honoured this year), and, finally, an international competition for first feature films was introduced in 2009. Even the nature of the opening film reflected this new trend. From 2009 on, it wasn’t just about a well-made film, but also one that had a buzz around it. In 2009, the festival opened with Steven Soderbergh’s The Informant, followed by David Fincher’s The Social Network, Bennett Miller’s Moneyball, and David O. Russell’s Silver Linings Playbook in years to come.

 

MFF has also garnered a lot of attention for the kind of foreign art house films it has screened in the last few years. Films such as The Turin Horse, The Artist, Amour, Beasts of the Southern Wild. Among this year’s screenings will be Blue Is the Warmest Colour, Inside Llewyn Davis and Le Passé to name a few. “They really track the best films that are being shown at various international film festivals,” says Aseem Chhabra, a film critic and writer who curates the New York Indian Film Festival. “To bring the films and significant jurypersons to India, which is still not a premier market for Hollywood and other foreign language films, is a remarkable feat.”

 

All these films have either been prizewinners or screened in the competition sections of major film festivals of the world. There is a curiosity about them, especially because most of them don’t find a theatrical release in India. And even if they do they are more often than not heavily censored. The interest in these films can also be attributed to a ‘good cinema’ watching culture in the country that is growing slowly but steadily with the proliferation of the internet. “Now people follow what’s happening in other festivals (across the world) online,” says Chhabra. “There’s an audience and they are hungry for good cinema.”

 

Successful film festivals are also often known by the filmmakers they discover. Filmmakers such as Steven Soderbergh, Quentin Tarantino, Wong Kar-Wai, Jafar Panahi, Darren Aronofsky, and, more recently, Ben Zeitlin all found fame through film festivals. This is possibly one of the reasons behind two of MFF’s new sections— ‘New Faces in Indian Cinema’, a non-competitive section which screens first and second films of Indian filmmakers, was added in 2010, and India Gold, a competitive section comprising Indian films that have not been released elsewhere in the country, in 2012. Aniruddha Guha, Film Editor at Time Out Mumbai, who is part of a 13-member selection panel at MFF, feels MFF has finally made a start at discovering new voices: “Ship of Theseus got a lot of attention this year. I saw Ship of Theseus last year in June, when it was entered into the competition category and it played at the festival where many people watched it, which helped create a lot of buzz.” But, since even films being screened in the India Gold section do not necessarily have to have their world premiere at MFF (something other better known festivals demand) the two acclaimed Indian films that screened at MFF last year—Miss Lovely and Ship of Theseus—were actually first noticed at film festivals abroad (Miss Lovely premiered at the Festival de Cannesand Ship of Theseus premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival).

 

Most leading film festivals around the world not only screen films that break free from conventional commercial restrictions but also host a kind of ‘art film market’ where such films can be picked up for distribution. MFF too introduced the Mumbai Film Mart in 2011. The objective was “to promote Indian films globally, beyond Bollywood. And also provide a platform for a lot of independent filmmakers,” says Rashmi Lamba, Manager of Mumbai Film Mart. In the last 3 years, the mart has helped release three mainstream Indian films (3 Idiots, Don 2, Jab Tak Hai Jaan) break into non-traditional foreign markets such as Japan. But the modest number of buyers (around 15 in 2011, 25 in 2012, and 50 this year) so far means films from Indian independent filmmakers are still waiting to be picked up.

 

While there’s no doubting that MFF is highly anticipated today by cinephiles in the city, it is yet to attract a sustained interest from filmmakers across the world. For instance, the filmmaker and leading actors for last year’s opening film, Silver Linings Playbook, besides Anupam Kher, were absent. So were a lot of other international filmmakers whose films screened at the festival. “Why is it that MAMI is not able to attract a lot of journalists for instance? Sure, there will be journalists coming from outside, but why not the kind of press that comes to Toronto or Berlin—500 to 600 journalists from around the world?” asks Chhabra, before answering the question: “But MAMI can’t have that because most of foreign language films that are screened in the festival have already been shown elsewhere.” He adds: “And even though they hold world premieres for Indian films, there’s very little excitement for Indian cinema abroad.”

 

The Mumbai Film Festival also differs from a lot of international film festivals because of the absence of a permanent venue. Unlike its counterparts in Toronto, Busan, and Venice, MFF has no cultural or cinema complex that serves as a nucleus. This deprives it of a personality. Currently, the film festival resembles a travelling cinema within the city. It kicked off at Y.B. Chavan Centre (Nariman Point) and has since then moved to Marine Lines, Wadala, Versova, Ghatkopar, Juhu, and Sion.

 

Also, the majority of the screening venues being located in South Bombay makes it difficult for people from far-flung suburbs to attend. Most screenings used to be in South Bombay in the initial years of the festival since its cinema halls were technically equipped, but the mushrooming of multiplexes with better technology has opened up many more possibilities.

 

“MFF was held at INOX and NCPA (National Centre for the Performing Arts) last year because both are in one area. So we have Metro and Liberty this year,” says Narayanan. But when deciding on venues for a film festival one has to consider both seating capacities as well as their proximity to the audience. The ideal MFF venue should have one cinema with a large seating capacity for the biggest draws, and there should be a multiplex or multiplexes to allow for multiple screenings as well.

 

Filmmaker Sudhir Mishra, MAMI trustee, reiterates the need for a cultural centre in Bombay: “There should be a facility built by the state for cultural occasions, preferably in a central location like Bandra, so it can be convenient for everyone to visit.” But the dynamics of the space-clogged city poses a logistical challenge to such a permanent venue for the festival.

 

Perhaps such a venue, with state-of-the-art technology, could help prevent technical glitches of the kind the festival witnessed in the last few years: issues with aspect ratio, missing subtitles, disappearing audio, screening cancellations. When asked about this, Amit Khanna says: “NCPA didn’t have the proper facilities, so temporary facilities were made. This year, we have two engineers from the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers of America (SMPTE) coming and helping us.”

 

Narayanan elaborates on the remedial measures MFF is taking this year to prevent such catastrophes: “We have brought in Real Image and Reliance MediaWorks, and there’s a big technical team working on that. But remember, even festivals like Cannes and Berlin have minor glitches.” Sudhir Mishra also underlines the need for dry runs before films are screened, which he says are already underway this time.

 

INOX, Nariman Point (one of the venues for last year’s MFF) had come under fire in 2012 for making people stand in line for tickets barely 30 minutes or an hour before films were screened. “They issued tickets for each show instead of letting us get tickets for multiple screenings in a day,” says Deepa Deosthalee, a film writer and last year’s MFF attendee. “It was a huge problem, especially for films that were in demand. I was unable to watch Miss Lovely for this reason.”

 

Narayanan says: “This was a decision made by the exhibitor, and not MFF”. In an effort to cut down on queues and long waits outside venues this year, MFF has now introduced a seat reservation system. Seats can be pre-booked online against a delegate pass. So now viewers can handpick the films they want to attend and make their bookings— a system followed by international film festivals. Delegates will, however, have to turn up at least 15 minutes before a screening to collect their tickets. MFF hopes this will make things easier for everybody. “If you are not there five minutes before (the film), your reservation will be cancelled,” says Narayanan assertively. Here’s hoping they are, in droves. For when all is noted and said on what makes for a successful film festival, nothing is more significant than its audience.

 

 

Firoz Khan has made a name for himself as the nation’s most popular Amitabh Bachchan lookalike. But his greatest gift is also his prison.

 

When Firoz Khan stood tall on a makeshift stage in Jaunpur, Uttar Pradesh, this June, there was no one around. His only companions were a microphone, two speakers, some chairs lying vacant and a multitude of banners surrounding him that read: “Arize kisaanon ke naam Junior Bachchan ki ek shaam (An evening of ‘Junior Bachchan’, dedicated to the ‘Arize farmers’)”.

 

Not far away from the stage was a bazaar, bustling with people. This absolute lack of any attention seemed to discomfit Firoz. Moments later, his voice boomed on the microphone: “Bhaiyon aur doston, meri jahan tak awaaz jaa rahi hai, mera kisaan bhaiyon se kehna hai ki yahan aa kar humaare program ko dekhne ki koshish karein (Brothers and friends, if my voice is reaching you then I want to ask my farmer brothers to come here and try to watch my show).”

 

Slowly, people began to trickle in. The voice seemed to draw them closer to the microphone. A rich, commanding voice. Most significantly, a voice whose familiarity is emblazoned into the subconscious of every Indian moviegoer. The denizens of Jaunpur were curious. They inched closer to the stage to answer an incredible question: What was Amitabh Bachchan, one of India’s biggest superstars, doing on this unremarkable afternoon in their town?

 

As the sun beat down on him, while he recited iconic dialogues from Bachchan’s movies to regale his audience, Firoz felt a searing pain that ran from his feet to his lower back. The pain was not new to Firoz. Because, when he impersonates Bachchan, his feet are not planted firmly on the ground. To rise up to Bachchan’s six feet and one inch a five feet and eight inch tall Firoz wears an inch-and-a-half of rubber padding under each foot. The padding raises his heels, slants his toes and invariably causes pain. Over time, he has learnt to live with it.

 

In 30 minutes, by the time Firoz had concluded his act, he was surrounded by more than a thousand people who refused to leave. They wanted to be near him, speak to him, ask for his autograph, touch his feet. By now the pain was heightened, but he also found it was easier to endure.

 

***

 

‘Arize’ is the name of a brand of rice seed manufactured by the Bayer Group, a German chemical, pharmaceutical and bio-technology multinational. Besides Firoz they have used popular singers Gurdas Maan and Altaf Raja, and Bhojpuri stars Manoj Tiwari and Ravi Kishan to market their products to the Indian heartland. For Firoz, this is only one of over hundreds of shows he has done, for hundreds of clients.

 

There are over a dozen Amitabh Bachchan lookalikes in the market, but Firoz has been in it for the long run. He has not only impersonated Bachchan for 16 years, he has done so across a whole spectrum of media— besides live shows there have been over 40 movies, 10 spoof and dance shows on television, 30 ad films and 8 music videos. TV shows such as Koffee with Karan, Boogie Woogie, MTV Fully Faltoo and Ek Do Teen. Music videos such as the one for Adnan Sami’s popular song Lift Kara De where the actor Govinda appeared as himself and Firoz appeared as Bachchan. Firoz has been Bachchan in TV commercials for AXE Deodorant as well as one for the Income Tax Department, asking conscientious Indians to file their returns on time. In Cadbury Dairy Milk’s ‘Pappu Pass Ho Gaya’ ad, Firoz was Bachchan’s body double. He played himself, a Bachchan lookalike, in Chandan Arora’s Main Madhuri Dixit Banna Chahti Hoon (2003). In Danny Boyle’s Oscar winning Slumdog Millionaire (2008), he played Bachchan.

 

***

 

“I am not a ‘Amitabh duplicate’,” says Firoz, leisurely climbing the stairs to reach his apartment, a one-bedroom-hall-kitchen on the third floor of a building in Mira Road, one of Mumbai’s more far-flung suburbs. “There are many lookalikes whose only job is to look like him. I don’t look that much like him. I act him out. You can call me more of a performer.”

 

That Firoz does not, at first glance, look like Bachchan, is true. He’s wearing a denim-shirt, a little tight around the stomach, and a pair of black cotton trousers with six pockets. But, when you look closely, certain similarities emerge. Deep set eyes, though Bachchan’s are much larger. A prominent nose. A wide forehead. An oval face with a well-defined jawline whose effect, for Firoz, has been diminished to some degree by an emerging double chin. He has a thick head of hair, parted from the left, it curls up along the sides, covering a portion of his ears.

 

A few minutes later, Firoz sprawls out on a black and red Rexine couch in his living room. The only window in the room is partially veiled by faded brown curtains with white and faded orange polka dots. It faces a five-storied building whose walls are covered with black fungus. Besides the couch, the living room is furnished with two red and black single-seater sofas, two small granite topped side-tables, a tiny closet and another table with a 17 inch TV and a stereo system. On one of the side-tables lie a couple of stray match sticks and a golden packet of chewing tobacco labelled ‘Miraag Tambako’ in Hindi. The other side-table has a laptop and two plastic containers full of medicines. The closet top doubles up as yet another table, displaying various trophies Firoz has received. One small trophy has a circular plaque, broken along its rim, with a picture of Amitabh Bachchan from the film Sarkar (2005). On its base are inscribed the words: “Sattarvein janamdin par sa prem bhent (A gift, with love, on your 70th birthday). Nataani Medical Hall.”

 

Firoz will turn 45 this year.

 

He lights a cigarette and does a Shah Rukh Khan impersonation. “Arre yaar kaisi baat karte hain aap, haan (What are you talking about)?” The slightly nasal, hurried voice of the Shah Rukh of the 90s. He cocks his head to one side for effect. During the course of conversation, Firoz breaks off to demonstrate his skills many times. He mimics his effeminate male friend, a street ruffian with a gruff voice, and, of course, Amitabh Bachchan: “Dekhta kya hai be? Ulte haath ka maarunga. Saala samajhta kya hai tu apne aap ko? (What are you looking at? I’ll slap you hard. What do you think of yourself?)” Away from the stage, in the comfort of his living room, when Firoz impersonates Bachchan he does not mouth off the superstar’s famous dialogues— he simply says anything he wants to, the way Bachchan would.

 

But for the padding in his shoes, Firoz’s metamorphosis into Bachchan is not really an elaborate process. He flares his nostrils, curls his upper lip and modulates his voice. “I just put on a wig, a French beard, do my hair like Amit ji, and that’s it,” he says, looking around for the wig. He relies very little on make-up. “What can you do with make-up? What will happen with powder?”

 

Finding the wig, he leaves the room to reappear in a few minutes. His hair is parted from the middle now, with a few strands falling on his forehead. He’s wearing sunglasses and a velvet scarf around his neck. A white shirt with blue stripes and an off-white blazer. His black trousers fall perfectly on a pair of boots that have heels that are at least an inch high. These give Firoz a considerably raised appearance. His gaze, barely visible through the sun glasses, is quiet, relaxed, self-assured. He seems to be smiling without actually doing so. He does not look like the actor on the fringes that he is. He seems to have found his highest calling.

 

In the building opposite, a little girl peers out of the window. She freezes for an instant, then breaks into a giggle and covers her face with a small notebook.

 

 

***

 

Amitabh Bachchan’s family name is actually Srivastava. ‘Bachchan’, which the renowned poet Harivansh Rai—Amitabh Bachchan’s father—chose as his pen name, and which became the family name thereafter, is actually colloquial usage in Uttar Pradesh for the eldest son of a family. Firoz too was the eldest among his three brothers. “All of them would call me Bachchan,” he says. “Aur Bachchan Bhai (What’s up Bachchan?)” was how he was addressed.

 

Firoz watched his first Amitabh Bachchan movie, Khoon Pasina (1977), in his native town, Budaun, in Uttar Pradesh, at the age of 10. In Budaun, people would collect just to stare at the posters of a Bachchan movie, put up outside theatres, 15 days before its release. Inside, they would hoot every time Bachchan appeared, throw money at the screen, dance on their seats or in the aisles.

 

It was after Khoon Pasina that Firoz began frequenting the theatres. Soon his friends began to say “The way you are talking right now, you look like Amitabh” or “We can see glimpses of Amitabh in you”. Then, one day, Firoz found himself in front of a mirror, mimicking Bachchan.

 

But it wasn’t until he was 15 that Firoz imitated Bachchan in front of others. It was when he had just emerged from the theatre after watching Deewaar. He had already begun to style his hair like Bachchan and model his gait and mannerisms on the superstar. He would stop at the paan shop and asked for a paan— not in his own voice, but in Bachchan’s. “A crowd soon gathered around,” says Firoz. “They were probably seeing something like this for the first time.” Since then, Firoz didn’t have to bother paying for paan or cigarettes at that shop. Firoz recalls the shopkeeper saying: “You stand here and do your thing. Seeing you, four to five more people come to my shop.” Soon, he began doing impersonations at other venues in town: a school, his house, his relatives’ weddings. “People would queue up in front of my house to hear dialogues of Amit ji,” he remembers. “I thought, even I am becoming something yaar.”

 

Determined to become an actor, Firoz decided to head to Bombay. But in a small town like his cinema was not seen as a worthwhile profession. Because cinema was a world which had “a lot of nangapan (nakedness).” “My father had not seen a single movie in his life. In fact, he could never get himself to pronounce Amitabh Bachchan properly,” Firoz says. “The closest he got was, ‘Amita ka Bachchan’.”

 

So Firoz ran away from home—from Budaun to Bombay—when he was 21. The year was 1990. But he stayed for just about a fortnight before heading back. He ran away to Bombay again after two years. He didn’t stay long then either. Firoz would rather not talk about those days. His younger brother, Parvez, says: “He left for Bombay in anger. Both times he was in Bombay for 15 to 20 days, till he ran out of money.”

 

Meanwhile, in 1991, actor Vijay Saxena had begun drawing a lot of attention for looking like Amitabh Bachchan after he did the movie Ramgarh Ke Sholay. Saxena followed this up with nine movies in just three years, playing the role of a Bachchan lookalike in most of these. But, in 1994, his career was cut short by a fatal road accident.

 

Firoz reached Bombay for the third time, on January 1, 1995. “I thought that the first thing I would do after reaching Bombay was meet Amit ji,” he says. “But, after I reached, things turned upside down. Bombay is so huge, I wouldn’t ever know where he was. So I wasn’t able to reach the locations where he was shooting. Instead, I would stand in front of his bungalow and wait to catch a glimpse of him.”

 

This time Firoz hadn’t come to Bombay alone. Accompanying him was his friend, Laal Shehazwani from Budaun, who had also come to Bombay to become an actor.

 

This time he stayed. Tired of waiting outside Bachchan’s bungalow he began looking for work instead. He spent months attending auditions, despite being rejected each time, sleeping at the railway stations and being shooed away from there by policemen. Finally, he met a shopkeeper from Budaun, who allowed him to sleep in his shop, in exchange for Firoz helping out with some accounts work.

 

Then, one evening, Firoz was passing by Kurla when he chanced upon a sign for what seemed to be a show by lookalikes. He went in to watch. One of the organizers announced: “Presenting to you the duplicates of Dharmendra and Anil Kapoor.” Firoz saw an opportunity.

 

He went backstage and told the organizer, Shakdeev (Firoz only remembers his first name) that he could “impersonate Amit ji really well”. Shakdeev was not entirely convinced. Firoz wasn’t very tall. He didn’t really look like Bachchan either. Firoz pleaded with him to let him demonstrate on stage “just for a minute”.

 

He stayed on for more. During those crucial few minutes Firoz stole the show. The audience burst out into applause. “I was better received than all the lookalikes who had performed before me.” After the show Shakdeev said to Firoz that he would get a suit made— just for him. Just like the one Amitabh wore then. “Also,” said Shakdeev. “I will get you high-heeled shoes.” And so it was settled. He was paid Rs 300 for every show.

 

But it was a year after this, in 1997, that he got his first real break. Actor and director Sachin Pilgaonkar cast him in a countdown-comedy show called Rin Ek Do Teen, which he had auditioned for. The show spoofed Bachchan’s biggest hits. The names of the films were tweaked for each episode. Muqaddar ka Sikandar became ‘Muqaddar ka Kalandar’, Deewaar became ‘The War’, Sholay became ‘Go-lay’. Firoz shot 52 episodes. He soon began getting calls for live shows outside Mumbai. Not for Rs. 300, but “30 times that amount”. He wasn’t going back to Budaun.

 

“In those days I used to feel like a superstar,” says Firoz. “Sets were being readied for me; cameras were being readied for me.”

 

He adds: “And all the films were being made for Firoz.” On the heels of Ek Do Teen, came a plethora of B-grade movies like Phool aur Aag (1999), Duplicate Sholay (a spoof on Sholay, 2002), Gangobai (2002), and Kabhi Kranti Kabhie Jung (2004), in most of which Firoz played a Bachchan lookalike.

 

Even among the overkill of Bachchan lookalikes today, Firoz holds sway. This is made evident in an episode of the TV show Entertainment Ke Liye Kuch Bhi Karega, judged by Farah Khan and Anu Malik. There are two Bachchan lookalikes, a ‘younger’ Amitabh Bachchan played by Firoz, and an ‘older’ Bachchan played by an actor named Rajkumar Bakhtiani. In the brief trying-hard-to-be-funny-but-tepid conversation that ensues, it’s clear who has more finesse. Rajkumar’s voice lacks the ring of the famous Bachchan baritone. It is overly solemn at times, and his portrayal of Bachchan’s mannerisms are simply not remarkable. Firoz, on the other hand, not only sounds eerily like Bachchan, he also seems to have seamlessly imbibed into his act Bachchan’s pauses, his gaze, the way the actor’s voice trails off after a robust dialogue, even his comic timing.

 

***

 

Firoz finally met Bachchan in 1999, on the sets of Kohram (released in August, the same year), 22 years after he first saw him on screen. Bachchan on screen had left him awestruck but standing before the man himself Firoz was overwhelmed by nervousness and joy. His hands trembled as he shook hands with the star. “I was scared and kept thinking about how he would react, what he would say,” he says. He had been imitating Bachchan effortlessly for 17 years, but in front of him, “I was trying to do something else, yet something else was happening.” At the end of the whole episode, Firoz felt “as if I was flying”.

 

Any lookalike’s career trajectory depends on the trajectory of the person he is imitating. His career runs parallel to that of the object of his impersonation. From 1995 to 1999, Bachchan himself seemed to be going through an identity crisis of sorts. He had returned to the movie business at the age of 53 and found he could no longer be the ‘angry young man’ that had made him India’s biggest star. This realization had been preceded by a spate of embarrassing, mediocre films such as Mrityudaata (1997) and Lal Badshaah (1999). Bachchan’s fortunes finally turned with Kaun Banega Crorepati (also called KBC, the Indian version of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire) that established him as what is possibly the nation’s first older star icon. He cemented this with a role in Mohabbatein (2000) directed by Aditya Chopra who had cast him not as a ‘character actor’ (which in those days still meant that he would merely play out a stereotype on screen, for roughly one-twentieth of the film’s running time) but in a well-etched pivotal part that had almost as much screen-time as the film’s lead actor Shah Rukh Khan.

 

Bachchan was not the only one to benefit from this turning point. “KBC benefitted me too,” says Firoz. “When I did MTV Fully Faltoo; there used to be episodes spoofing Kaun Banega Crorepati called ‘Kaise Banoonga Crorepati (How Will I Become A Millionaire) ’,” says Firoz.

 

Being associated with a big name in the incestuous Mumbai film industry provides a unique advantage to any aspiring actor. Firoz had no godfather but being associated with the biggest name of them all, however obliquely, helped. “He got in pretty easily with the help of Amitabh,” says Rana, Firoz’s wife. “He would have had to struggle a lot as Firoz.”

 

Says Firoz’s competitor Rajkumar: “Due to Bachchan Saab I’m able to make a living. His level of success affects that of us lookalikes.” He had given up on acting for nearly a decade before KBC signalled his return. “It’s quite clear that had there been no KBC, I wouldn’t have made a comeback either.”

 

***

 

Yet today, 16 years after his first big break with Ek Do Teen, Firoz can’t help but wonder if it would have been better if he had struggled, as Firoz.

 

“My initial interest was to do roles of different types,” he says. “That did not happen. Amit ji was so famous that once they got to know about this talent of mine, this is all they wanted me to do. But I have so many talents they are not even aware of. They don’t want to see those.”

 

He adds: “I am fully confident that even in front of Amit ji, I can act as Firoz. I would have no hesitation, no fear.”

 

So there are two Firozes. One, who is grateful for the breaks he has got, and one who rues each of them.

 

In an attempt to reconcile the two, he defends his impersonations: “Even if I enact Amitabh, I do it in my own style, which allows me to show so many things that Amit ji might not have done. I mix my comedy and Amit ji’s comedy.”

 

Also, he says: “Acting as oneself, which so many Indian actors do, is the easiest thing in the world. But being someone else is so much more difficult. Remembering his dialogues, his expressions, how he walks, carrying all those things within you… That’s a double pressure. I don’t have to do all of this while acting as myself, or even while building a character from scratch.” He adds: “You see some artists in a serial, but then you don’t know where they have disappeared. They just come and go. At least I am not like them.” This is his strongest argument so far.

 

Firoz’s friend, Laal Shehazwani, who had come from Budaun to Bombay with him to become an actor, has long since gone back. He tried his luck as an Akshay Kumar lookalike but gave up on his acting aspirations and left the city in four years. Now he runs a property trading business in Budaun. “A duplicate can only work as a duplicate. They will not be able to do their own acting,” says Laal. “Firoz’s identity in Bombay is as an Amitabh duplicate. He doesn’t have an identity of his own.”

 

Even as Amitabh Bachchan managed to reinvent himself, to become more than Bachchan, with his comeback in a series of powerful but understated character parts in the 2000s, Firoz has not been able to exorcise himself of Bachchan.

 

Firoz admits that, of the 40 odd films he did, those that didn’t cast him as a Bachchan lookalike had him play roles that were just as stereotypical, the most common one being that of a dacoit. (In fact, wherever Firoz has not played Bachchan, he has gotten a negative part. He puts this down to his voice which he feels “is very impactful in negative roles”.) “There was nothing to do in these movies,” he says. He was new to the industry when he signed on this spate of tacky films, made by likes of directors such as Kanti Shah (the king of the Indian B movie industry). “There was a lack of respect. I couldn’t make sense of the story. They did not do things in an ‘artistic’ fashion.”

 

Then, suddenly, there is an outburst: “If people ask me, ‘What did you do of your own?’ I would tell them, ‘I would tell you what I can do once you put me in front of the camera.’ Give me a chance at least.”

 

As you spend time with Firoz, you realize suddenly why he doesn’t need to mouth dialogues from Bachchan’s films to sound like the star did in the eighties. Firoz has played Bachchan for so long, he has become ‘Bachchanesque’. In the usual course of his life he sounds like the angry young man Bachchan isn’t any more. Like an actor stuck in the middle of a biopic that was canned.

 

He claims he still did these films because: “I did not want to sit idle. Those movies helped me take care of my family.”

 

When he was finally offered a ‘good role’, a film with Rajpal Yadav (a noted character actor) with a good six to seven minute part that required him to act not impersonate, he had to pass it up. “I couldn’t do the movie because I was stuck in a live show on the date.” A live show impersonating Bachchan.

 

***

 

Occasionally Firoz has managed to step out of the mould. He acted in 10 episodes of a Star TV serial Saath Nibhaana Saathiya, where he played a feudal lord, and around 40 episodes of NDTV Imagine’s Rehna Hai Teri Palkon Ki Chhaon Mein, where, again, he played a troublemaker.

 

Komal Kumar, a Kannada actor and producer, had cast Firoz as a Bachchan lookalike for the Kannada movie Radhana Ganda, released this year. After the shoot, Firoz said to Komal: “Bhaisahab (Brother), without Amitabh Bachchan ji also, I can act.”

 

“I could see that he was very spontaneous and quick,” says Komal. So, in his film Nandeesha, released in December last year, Komal cast Firoz as ‘J. K.’, a villain in his own right, who has 25 to 30 minutes of screentime. “I am planning to cast him in another movie too,” Komal says. “I will be giving him a Hindi lecturer’s character. When Firoz was acting as J. K., not in a single frame was he seen as Bachchan. He was a different Firoz.” If this role of a lecturer, his first non-negative role, works out, it may be a new beginning.

 

***

 

Firoz’s 8 year old son, Faiz, is sitting just a few feet from us, in the living room, watching Transformers on TV. When he was younger he had mistaken Firoz for Amitabh Bachchan. He had seen his father in one of his performances, and Bachchan on TV, and had been unable to tell the difference. “When he grew older, one day, he said to me: ‘But papa, this is not you’. I made him understand that I do mimicry, that this is also one kind of a work.”

 

Firoz wants a movie to be made on his life— “Showcasing both my lives, as Amitabh and as Firoz. You know, those ‘different’ kind of movies? I want to tell them— this is my height. I want to tell them how I become Amitabh, how I wear those high heeled shoes. How it pains. How, when my show gets over, I go back to my room and put my feet in hot water. I want everyone to know who lookalikes are actually. They think all lookalikes are the same.” Firoz feels there is only one person in India who can make such a movie: “Aamir Khan. Only if someone like him makes that movie, will it have the necessary impact.”

 

***

 

He shows me a photograph of himself as the feudal lord he plays in Saath Nibhaana Saathiya. He is wearing a pathani and has a moustache that is twirled at the ends.

 

“As ‘J. K.’ in Nandeesha, my face looks like a dog.” Firoz has stood up all of a sudden, his back straight as a rod. His eyes glare at the wall in front of him. “Randhir Singh Chaudhary bolte hain mereko (They call me Randhir Singh Chaudhary),” he says, in a threatening voice.“Is poore ilaake ke andar kisi mein utni himmat nahin ki Randhir Singh ki taraf ankh utha kar bhi baat kar sake (There is no one in this area who has enough courage to look Randhir Singh in the eye).”

 

He laughs menacingly. He turns towards me, vigorously running his hands through his hair. “If I do my hair like this,” he asks. “Will anyone say I look like Amitabh?”

 

 

The story of Bombay Talkies that spawned India’s first ‘star’ Ashok Kumar and film families that hold sway over the industry till this date.

 

 

Khandwa, early 1930s

 

Kumudlal Ganguly was a misfit, a square peg in a round hole. Born in a family where every male member was either a practicing lawyer or harbouring dreams of becoming one, he was not really interested in the trade. At the insistence of his father, Kumudlal went to Calcutta to study law at the city’s prestigious Presidency College. Once there, he went straight to the principal of the college and, with the straight-shooting demeanour that would remain with him all his life, told him that he didn’t find the prospect of the legal profession very alluring, but wanted to become a director of films instead. The principal, a Mr. Ramanand Chatterjee, advised Kumudlal to attend the morning classes between 7 to 8 am, which would allow him the rest of the day to indulge his fantasies.

 

Kumudlal’s sister Sati Devi was married to Sashadhar Mukherjee, an M.Sc graduate who had moved to Bombay in search of work, and had begun work as a sound designer in films. When he heard of Kumudlal’s interest in cinema, Sashadhar called his young brother-in-law to Bombay. Kumudlal was then introduced to Himanshu Rai, the founder of Bombay Talkies.

 

***

 

Bombay Talkies was India’s first ‘corporatized’ film company, the first film company to be listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE). Also, the launching pad for most of Hindi cinema’s biggest stars. The company firmly established Mumbai (then Bombay) as the nerve-centre of the Hindi film industry. But the events that led to its inception were set in motion across Calcutta, England, and Germany.

 

Though things really began in London, sometime in the 1920s.

 

 

In the beginning there was the trinity.

 

There are three people who are responsible, primarily, for the birth of Bombay Talkies. The first is Himanshu Rai who was born in an illustrious Bengali family in 1892. After graduating from Calcutta University, Rai was shipped off to England to practice law. Once in London, he became a participant in the theatre scene and worked in Chu Chin Chow, Oscar Asche’s landmark musical.

 

The second is Niranjan Pal who was the progeny of Bipin Chandra Pal— a renowned nationalist and one of the famous trio of freedom fighters colloquially referred to as ‘Lal-Bal-Pal’ (besides Pal, the trio comprised Lala Lajpat Rai and Bal Gangadhar Tilak). Niranjan, like his father, was a radical from the word go. Bubbling with nationalist fervour, he was known to have once jumped a Scotsman and made off with his gun. It was to evade the consequences of this that Pal was sent to London. Soon, he found himself writing for the stage, and attained much success with plays such as The Goddess.

 

The third name is that of Devika Rani, the original diva of Hindi Cinema. Rani was a grandniece of the great poet and polymath Rabindranath Tagore. Born in 1908 at Waltair (now Visakhapatnam, in Andhra Pradesh) to Col. M. N. Choudheri, Devika Rani Choudheri travelled to England for higher education, a norm among the Indian intelligentsia at the time. At the tender age of 16, she was awarded scholarships at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and the Royal Academy of Music, both in London.

 

***

 

Niranjan Pal continued his winning streak with a number of plays at London’s West End. The stage brought him in contact with Himanshu Rai, who was already toying with the idea of making films. They decided to collaborate on an adaptation of Sir Edwin Arnold’s epic poem ‘The Light of Asia’. It was the 1920s. German cinema was making great strides, with expressionist films like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and Nosferatu breaking new ground. Rai arrived in Munich to scout filmmakers at the Emelka Film Company. The 48 year-old Franz Osten came forward. In what was to be a historic decision, Franz Osten not only helmed The Light of Asia/ Prem Sanyas (1925), but ended up directing more than a dozen Indian films over the next fifteen years. Rai himself played the lead in Prem Sanyas, as Prince Siddhartha, or Gautama Buddha. Pal wrote out the scenes for the film.

 

How Devika Rani came to meet Himanshu Rai is an unresolved mystery. Some say they met a few years after Prem Sanyas while others believe they not only met earlier, but it was actually Devika who designed costumes for Prem Sanyas. By the time she was 20, she had already been in touch with Marlene Dietrich, assisted the great Fritz Lang, and begun professional work in textile design. By some accounts, Devika was staying as a house-guest of Niranjan Pal and his family.Legend has it that Rai was introduced to her at a party. One may imagine that Rai would have been taken in by Devika Rani’s enormous reservoir of talent, as much as by her beauty. He offered her a job designing costumes for his films.

 

In three years, there was a forgettable film called Shiraz (1928), followed by the classic A Throw of Dice/ Prapancha Pash (1929). The latter, a lavishly mounted Mahabharata re-telling, remains one of the few by Osten and Rai that survives in its entirety, and has seen a revival on the film festival circuit in the past few years. By the time the film was complete, Rai and Devika got married— a relationship that was to be inordinately tumultuous in the years to come.

 

With the advent of the ‘talkies’, or the sound films, the movie business in Germany was in a state of flux. Rai returned to London, his young bride in tow. In 1933, the duo co-starred in Karma, a bilingual— their first talkie. Today the film is mostly remembered for a passionate kiss they shared on-screen. But back then this first Indian talkie to have English dialogues was met with great excitement by the British press. Leading periodicals of the time acknowledged Devika Rani’s star aura and grace, and praised her impeccable accent.  The London Star said: “You will never hear a lovelier voice or diction, or see a lovelier face.”

 

 

By now, both of them had acquired a rich and varied experience in filmmaking. Soon they set sail for India. Whenever Rai had come to India, the state of the film trade in the country had disconcerted him. He longed to implement what he had learnt in Britain and Germany, and set up a major studio that would churn out film after glorious film, making India a force to reckon with in the international arena. In 1934, Bombay Talkies was born.

 

Parsi businessman Sir F. E. Dinshaw’s summer mansion in Malad was transformed into a studio for this purpose. Bombay Talkies was incorporated as a public limited company and listed on the BSE. On its board, Himanshu Rai assembled the crème de la crème of Bombay’s business class then: besides Dinshaw, there was  Sir Chunilal Mehta, Sir Chimanlal Setalvad, Sir Phiroze Sethna, Sir Cowasjee Jehangir and Sir Richard Temple. Rajnarayan Dube, the construction magnate, emerged as the chief financier and, in time, the truest mentor of Bombay Talkies. The German director Franz Osten and his team of technicians—cinematographer Josef Wirsching, set designer Karl Von Spreti, sound recordist Len Hartley, lab technician Wilhelm Zolle—joined in on this ambitious enterprise. In a way, Bombay Talkies laid the foundations for international collaboration in Hindi films— crossovers in the truest sense, long before the term came into being. The studio attracted talent in droves from every corner of India: Filmmakers like Najam Naqvi, N.R. Acharya, Sashadhar Mukherjee, M. I. Gharamse, Savak Wacha and R. D. Mathur, actors like Ramshakal Sarikhe, Kishore Sahu, Snehprabha Pradhan and Renuka Devi and writers like Saadat Hasan Manto and Khwaja Ahmed Abbas.

 

 

Star ‘Dom’

 

Let us return now to Kumudlal Ganguly. He joined Bombay Talkies as a technician. It was the early 1930s. He was busy learning the craft of filmmaking. Kumudlal apprenticed in almost every department— sound, editing, music, cinematography, and he was curious about everything. The veteran cinematographer Josef Wirsching, however, took great umbrage to Kumudlal tinkering with his camera. He insisted that he be moved to another department.

 

Bombay Talkies’ first major picture, Jawani Ki Hawa (1935) was a crime thriller featuring Devika Rani playing the lead opposite the young Najmul Hasan, who was debuting with that film. The film instigated furious protests by the Parsi community of Bombay, who objected to the inclusion of two Parsi women in the film (acting in the movies was looked down upon in those times, and so the community wanted no part of it). But the din died down soon after, and the film did well.

 

After Jawani Ki Hawa, another movie called Jeevan Naiya with the same lead pair was being shot, when a curious incident occurred, that was to seal the fate of Bombay Talkies, and lead to far-reaching changes in the Indian film industry.

 

During the shoot Devika Rani eloped with Najmul Hasan. All hell broke loose at Bombay Talkies. The future of the film, and Himanshu Rai’s marriage, was at stake. Sashadhar Mukherjee, disturbed at his mentor’s predicament, swung into action. He convinced Devika Rani to return, sans Najmul. How he managed to do this, what he said to her, remains unknown till this date. Though he forgave his wife, Rai was livid at Hasan, expectedly, and resolved to never work with him again. So, at the end of it all, they were left without a lead actor for the film.

 

Kumudlal, still in his 20s then, had a great singing voice, besides good looks. Mukherjee suggested him as a replacement. Kumudlal was reluctant to act initially, but he agreed to give it a try just once, and then get back to his job as a technician. A hurried screen test was done. Josef Wirsching was happy with the outcome though director Franz Osten wasn’t. But Rai persisted, and soon Kumudlal was the hero of Jeevan Naiya.

 

But there was another problem. With a name like ‘Kumudlal Ganguly’ for the lead the film’s prospects at the box office would be abysmally low. A screen-name was sought. Kumudlal Ganguly was rechristened with the name that we know him by. Jeevan Naiya, starring ‘Ashok Kumar’, was released in 1936 and India’s first real star, a man who can be said to have paved the way for the emergence of the ‘star system’ in Hindi cinema, was born.

 

Ashok Kumar’s first truly successful film, Achhut Kanya (1936), was made and released in the same year as Jeevan Naiya. The tale of a Brahmin boy (Kumar) falling for an ‘untouchable’ girl (Devika) was based on a short story by Niranjan Pal. The film was a runaway success and the song Main Ban Ki Chidiya, sung by Kumar himself, was on everyone’s lips. The lead pair of Ashok Kumar and Devika Rani went on to become a sure-fire formula for success. They featured in one film after another: Janam Bhoomi (1936), Izzat (1937), Prem Kahani (1937), Savitri (1937)… The reluctant hero became a sensation.

 

Ashok Kumar can be said to be the first true ‘star’ in Hindi films for many reasons. But the one that comes to mind first and foremost is that, realizing his marketability, he became the first actor in India who began to charge rates that were beyond the salaries offered by the studios. As acclaimed writer and close friend Saadat Hasan Manto (who also worked for Bombay Talkies) wrote in his literary sketch of Kumar, (published in an anthology of his writings called Stars from Another Sky):

 

When he moved from the laboratory to acting, his monthly salary was fixed at seventy-five rupees, a sum he accepted happily. In those days, for a single person living in a far-flung village, which Malad was, it was a lot of money. When his salary was doubled, he was even happier. Not long after, when it was raised to two hundred and fifty rupees, he was very nervous. Recalling that occasion, he said to me, “My God… it was a strange feeling. When I took the money from the studio cashier, my hand was trembling. I did not know where I was going to keep it. I had a place, a tiny house with one bed, two or three chairs, and the jungle outside. What would I do if thieves paid me a visit at night? What if they came to know that I had two hundred and fifty rupees? I felt lost… I have always been terrified of thefts and robberies, so I finally hid the money under my mattress. That night I had horrible dreams, so next morning I took the money to the post office and deposited it there.”

While Ashok was telling me this story, outside, a filmmaker from Calcutta was waiting to see him. The contract was ready but Ashok did not sign it because while he was offering eighty thousand rupees, Ashok was insisting on one lakh. And to think that only some years earlier he had been at a loss to know what to do with two hundred and fifty rupees!

 

 

House of Cards

 

In 1936, the year of Kumar’s acting debut, Niranjan Pal and Himanshu Rai had a major falling out. Pal had written some articles for a magazine named Filmland, which were scathing in their criticism of the use of foreign technicians in Indian films. Some of them specifically cited the example of Franz Osten. Rai was furious and forbade Pal from expressing such controversial opinions in print. Niranjan Pal walked out of Bombay Talkies, never to look back again.

 

Pal was replaced by Saradindu Bandyopadhyay, a Bengali writer famous for having created the fictional detective Byomkesh Bakshi (popularized nationally after he was played by Rajit Kapur on Doordarshan in a series directed by Basu Chatterjee in the 1990s). Within two years of Bandyopadhyay’s joining, three films were released by Bombay Talkies: Nirmala (1938), Vachan (1938) and Durga (1939). Vachan was the debut of comedian Rajendra Nath, whose portrayal of the character of ‘Popatlal’, later in the day, would become so famous that the name of the character would become synonymous with his own.

 

Meanwhile, Franz Osten had joined the Nazi Party and, with the onset of the Second World War, the Indian government came down heavily on Osten and his team. With their arrest several Bombay Talkies productions were interrupted. Some of them, like Kangan (1939), were completed in a hurry. But even most of these flopped miserably. Rai began to show symptoms of an impending mental breakdown. The situation worsened and finally he had to be admitted to a hospital. As Rai’s team met him at the hospital for his approval of a script, he grabbed the sheets of paper and garbled something unintelligibly. A few minutes after this Himanshu Rai—the founder of the most prolific studio Hindi cinema had ever seen—was dead. It was May 16, 1940.

 

Devika Rani stepped in as her husband’s successor. She divided Bombay Talkies into two production units, headed by Amiya Chakravarty and Sashadhar Mukherjee respectively. A young Raj Kapoor had joined as assistant to director Kidar Sharma and Amiya Chakravarty. Doubling up as the clapper-boy, even sweeping floors, Raj Kapoor learned filmmaking on the job. The fact that his father Prithviraj was a renowned actor of the era made little difference. During the making of Vish Kanya (1943), the future showman was busy fixing his hair in the mirror as he always did, before hammering the clap. But this time, the director Kidar Sharma was in a hurry as it was a sunset scene and it was almost dark. Raj took his own time and in a fit of rage, Sharma landed a resounding slap on the boy’s cheek. Sharma admittedly felt sorry later on, and perhaps this, as well as his talent and enthusiasm, had something to do with Kapoor’s first break as a hero with Neel Kamal, directed by Sharma, four years later.

 

Meanwhile, Yusuf Khan, Kapoor’s childhood friend from his early years in Peshawar, was making a living working at the Army Canteen in Pune. Devika Rani spotted him while on a trip to Pune, and enquired whether he’d like to act. Yusuf curtly refused. He had been made to believe that acting wasn’t an honourable profession. Devika Rani persisted. Finally, Yusuf relented and it was decided that he’d star in Jwar Bhata (1944), to be directed by Amiya Chakravarty. Eminent novelist and screenwriter Bhagwati Charan Verma decided on a screen name for him— ‘Dilip Kumar’.

 

 

They came, they saw, they glittered.

 

Ashok Kumar had garnered unprecedented popularity with hits like Bandhan (1940), Jhoola (1941) and Naya Sansar (1941). His pairing with Leela Chitnis or Devika Rani always worked. But Kismet (1943), directed by Gyan Mukherjee, was the film that consolidated Ashok Kumar’s position as the most valued star of the era. It ran for three years, a record unbroken for thirty years, till Sholay arrived on the scene.

 

During this time, a major rift emerged at Bombay Talkies, between Devika Rani on one side and Sashadhar Mukherjee and Ashok Kumar on the other. Mukherjee, Kumar and some other key personnel quit Bombay Talkies and laid the foundation for a new studio. They named it ‘Filmistan’. With their departure, Bombay Talkies plunged into darkness. Films of this period from Bombay Talkies, such as Char Ankhen (1944), Jwar Bhata and Pratima (1945), were all expensive flops. The proverbial last nail in the coffin was dealt by Devika Rani herself, who chose to turn her back to the movies by marrying Svetoslav Roerich, an acclaimed Russian painter, and settling down amidst the idylls of Himachal (they later moved to a sprawling estate on the outskirts of Bangalore). Bombay Talkies, much like a tattered currency note, changed hands a number of times during the next three years. Ashok Kumar, producer Savak Vacha and cinematographer Josef Wirsching each returned to their home turf and, during these brief periods, Bombay Talkies witnessed flashes of its lost glory: Milan (1946), Nateeja (1947), Majboor (1948) and Ziddi (1948).

 

The casting of Ziddi’s protagonist makes for an interesting story. During an elaborate meeting on the film’s casting, Ashok Kumar stepped outside for a smoke and noticed a youngster waiting, distress wrought on his face. When he enquired, the boy said that his name was Dharam Dev Pishorimal Anand, and that he wanted to become an actor. His first film Hum Ek Hain (1946) had tanked, and he was hoping for a better launch with Bombay Talkies. Kumar decided on the young man as Ziddi’s hero, despite objections by other members of his team. The film went on to be a huge hit, and two new stars were born: Dev Anand and Kishore Kumar, who had debuted in playback singing with Ziddi.

 

Another playback singer was waiting in the wings at the time. A young Lata Mangeshkar was chosen by Ashok Kumar to sing for Mahal (1949), a thriller directed by Kamal Amrohi. India’s first gothic horror film, Mahal became an overnight phenomenon, and made stars of two young women: Lata Mangeshkar (her song Aayega Aanewaala is still as popular as it was over half a century ago), and Madhubala, the leading lady. Ashok Kumar’s next film Sangram (1950) helmed by Gyan Mukherjee, featured the actor in his most striking negative role, and launched the actress Nalini Jaywant.

 

Then, Ashok Kumar and his entourage left Bombay Talkies for a second time. This dealt a severe blow, one the studio never quite recovered from. The next few films from the company—Mashaal (1950), Maa (1952) and Tamasha (1952)—sank without a trace. In those gloomy days, another filmmaker, who was to become a giant of Indian cinema, had been brought in to save the ship. Bimal Roy had only directed Bengali films till then, and he visited Bombay with the intent of doing just one film, Maa, and returning to Calcutta. He stayed back, however, and created history later with Do Bigha Zameen (1953), but his initial films for Bombay Talkies didn’t work. Some of the stars came forward to work for free for the studio, as their tribute to an institution that had launched them. But it was time to draw the curtains. In 1954, two decades since its inception, Bombay Talkies shut down for good.

 

 

Mumbai, 2013

 

In the following years, Ashok Kumar scaled new heights of popularity, and later moved on to character roles. Raj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar and Dev Anand went on to become the first big ‘star-triumvirate’ of Hindi cinema in the 1950s. Filmistan produced many a successful film and bred talents like Nasir Hussain— who went on to be a successful producer himself, and happened to have a nephew named Aamir Khan. One of his films, Yaadon Ki Baarat (1973), in which he cast this nephew as a child actor, was written by two young writers called Salim Khan and Javed Akhtar. Salim’s most lasting contribution to Hindi cinema, other than the legendary scripts he wrote, is in the form of his son, Salman Khan who, along with Aamir and Shah Rukh, makes up the big star-triumvirate of today.

 

Sashadhar Mukherjee, after a glorious career producing gems like Munimji (1955), Tumsa Nahi Dekha (1957) and Paying Guest (1957), and setting up his own production house called Filmalaya, also became the patriarch of an illustrious film family of stalwarts, such as filmmakers Subodh and Shomu Mukherjee, actors Joy and Deb Mukherji and the actress Tanuja (Shomu’s wife). The next generation of the family has added one filmmaker—Ayan Mukerji, who directed Wake Up Sid and Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani—and three actresses—Kajol, Sharbani and Rani Mukerji—to our cinemascape. Of them, Kajol and Rani Mukerji are the most well known. The latter’s last film was one of an anthology shot by some of today’s most acclaimed filmmakers. It was put together to commemorate a centenary of Indian cinema. It was named, appropriately, Bombay Talkies.

 

Also read: The Man who Missed the Train. On Najmul Hasan, whose tryst with Devika Rani nearly destroyed India’s most famous film studio.

 

Actress Shwetha Menon’s decision to incorporate footage of her giving birth to her daughter in a film has led to an outcry. A TBIP report.

It is not uncommon for a woman to work when she is pregnant unless, perhaps, if she happens to be an actress. “I wanted to work during my pregnancy. I just never thought I would be working up to the delivery,” says 39 year old Malayalam film actress Shwetha Menon. She managed to work on three films during her pregnancy. Of these three, Kalimannu stands out. Kalimannu explores a woman’s journey to becoming a mother. Not only did Menon’s pregnancy fit in as part of the film’s narrative, her delivery was also shot on camera and the footage of her giving birth to her daughter was incorporated in the film. While this was quite unconventional, Menon did not anticipate the furore that it would cause, even way before its release on the 22^nd of August.

Menon, who has won the Kerala State Film Award for the Best Actress twice, met with Director Blessy at an awards function when she was pregnant. She had been keen to continue working at that point and had known that Blessy had the perfect story for her. “He got to know that I’m pregnant and everything. Then we spoke about it and then Kalimannu happened. It was just the process and timing. Nothing else.”

While the film seeks to explore the connection between a mother and her unborn child, the conflict at its centre is made up of the resistance the protagonist, played by Menon, faces when she uses the sperm of her husband, who is brain dead, to get pregnant via Intra Vitro Fertilization. In the film her decision causes enormous controversy— leading to objections from politicians, religious heads and society in general. As life follows art, these controversies have been closely mirrored in real life, when public figureheads began to speak out against the use of the live footage of the birth in the film. While the reel version takes on a more dramatic tone, the objections raised—both in the film and outside of it—have revolved around the ‘values’ that stem from ‘Indian tradition’ and the ‘sanctity of motherhood’.

In November 2012, while the film was still under production, word spread about Menon’s actual delivery being shot to be used as a part of the film’s narrative. G. Karthikeyan, Speaker of the Kerala Legislative Assembly, was one of the first to object. He asked why women’s rights groups who protest against the derogatory portrayal of women in advertisements were not concerned. Karthikeyan’s statement sparked off other voices of protest. Sobha Surendran, President of the BJP Mahila Morcha in Kerala, argued vehemently against artistic license in this case: “This is not art. In my opinion, using a woman’s delivery is not art. Art should be manifested through the acting. The emotions that a woman goes through in her delivery should not be (conveyed through) the expressions captured in the actual labour room. If it is (meant for) art, it should be recreated for art. There are so many films in which the actresses have acted out such scenes.”

Karthikeyan and Surendran are yet to the see the film, which is still running in theatres, but they stand firmly by their statements. Says Karthikeyan, “At the time, when the director himself had said that they were going to shoot this scene, I had asked whether it was the right thing to do. Didn’t it go against motherhood? If you ask me tomorrow, I will still stand by it.”

Surendran wonders if the scene was just a gimmick for the film to grab the audience’s attention.  “To make the film a success, they were asking politicians to watch the film,” she says. “Even to me, the producer said, ‘Watch the film and express your opinion to various TV Channels and reporters.’ This is the first time a producer has asked this of me. It has never happened before.”

Surendran also believes that the use of this footage in a film violates the sanctity of childbirth. “Delivering a baby is sacred. Mothers here have done it with great care, with regard for privacy. She (Menon) tried to use it as an experiment in her film. She has the right to do that. And just as she has the right to do that, to show live birth to the audience, mothers have a right to say that it is wrong.”

Whether the scene was a publicity stunt for the film seems immaterial because the actress had consented to it being shot and shown. However, Surendran did more than just “say that it is wrong”. She asked that the Government of Kerala to prevent the film from screening in theatres, even asking for the Chief Minister Oommen Chandy to intervene, and threatened to stall the film if it was released.

The exhibitors appear to be disgruntled by the scene as well. The Kerala Film Exhibitors Federation President, Liberty Basheer, was in agreement with Karthikeyan and Surendran. “My main objection was that a scene like that cannot be shown in theatres,” he says. “And this decision was taken by the whole federation.”

Even though the controversy raged on, nobody really knew what the objectionable scene looked like, what it included and what it didn’t. Through the uproar, Menon remained unfazed: “There is a saying ‘Kaanatha poorathe patti nammakku parayam pattilla. (One can’t talk about a carnival one didn’t go to).’ She explains, “I don’t think we tried to disrespect a single woman on this earth. We kept saying ‘Let Kalimannu come. Kalimannu is not about the delivery. Kalimannu has another point of view. It’s not only the delivery and it’s not that thing that we are planning to show, as you are thinking.’ There were so many things that we were trying to say but nobody was listening.”

One of the most vocal voices of support from the Malayalam film industry has been B. Unnikrishnan, the General Secretary of the Film Employees Federation of Kerala. He also has a cameo in the film, as himself. In the film, just as in life, Unnikrishnan argues against the protagonist’s detractors, supporting Meera’s decision to use the sperm of her husband to conceive her child. To the various hecklers of the movie, he has this to say: “Everyone knows that it’s injustice to do this to a work of art. Especially because the issue has to do with a woman, everyone is panicking. It reveals the patriarchy within us. For instance, Mohanlal was nude in a scene from Blessy’s film Thanmathra. Then it didn’t have this controversy. But when it comes to Shwetha Menon’s delivery there is one. It just shows our male bias.”

Once the film was complete, the Censor Board cleared it with a U/A certificate and the Kerala Film Chamber of Commerce extended their complete support. Speculations were rife over whether the final cut had the objectionable scenes— given that the protests had been raging on from before it was completed. “When newspaper reports came out, it said that the scenes had been censored. Blessy made a statement saying that that is incorrect and that the scene is still there,” Basheer says. Media reports quoted Blessy as saying that there were five scenes in the film that showed the delivery of the child.

“Even when discussing the film the day before its release, Blessy and Shwetha were not ready to reveal to the public, whether these scenes were a part of the film,” says Surendran. “And, if so, which of them were. The director and the actor were being secretive.”

Menon rejects the notion that they needed to give an explanation or clarify these doubts. “Everyone asked us why we weren’t defending the film. The only way we could defend it was by releasing the film, a film that has a U/A certificate. The same persons should have gone and seen the film and commented on it.”

Both Basheer and Surendran believe that their protests were successful and that the film was edited to suit their demands. Surendran says, “They have not been able to include the scenes to the extent that Blessy had thought, or Shwetha had wanted to, and that has been precisely because of the protests by the public.” Basheer insists further that there were cuts made to tone down the scene, even after the Censor Board had cleared the film, and only then did the Kerala Film Exhibitors Federation agree to screen the film. “Earlier, the film had scenes from the delivery itself. What you now see mostly is just doctors.”

Menon denies this. According to her, it was not the Kerala Film Exhibitors Federation but Basheer alone who had objected to the film and there were no changes made to the film after the censor certificate had been obtained.

Unnikrishnan agrees: “That’s incorrect. There have been no cuts (in the child-birth scene). No other agency has a right there. It was the director’s cut which was approved by the Censor Board, and it was the same film which was exhibited.”

***

Until its release the film remained embroiled in controversy. A member of the public, Mada Swamy, filed a petition in the Kerala High Court asking for the delivery scenes to be removed from the film. The High Court however rejected the petition on the ground that the scenes had been filmed with the consent of Menon.

“It is my body and I have full right to do whatever I want to do,” says Menon. “I decide where I should take it. I should be considered. I’m very grateful to God that I could work.” This attitude irks the BJP’s Mahila Morcha no end. Says Surendran, “I’m still against a woman taking the decision to use her delivery, in the name of artistic license, not through acting but as it is, and selling it for a film.”  Surendran cites the example of another actress. “On the Indian silver screen, I don’t think Shwetha Menon has risen to the heights that Aishwarya Rai has. When she was pregnant, and one of India’s biggest stars, Amitabh Bachchan said that, ‘I don’t want a crowd greeting the arrival of my grandchild.’ In a context where actresses and women are guarding their privacy, Shwetha herself said in an interview that when she knew that she was pregnant she thought about how it could be used for this film. That she used her delivery as an opportunity is my objection.”

Menon says of Surendran, “Somebody of that stature making that statement can affect a lot of people. When you say something about the film, I don’t mind. But when the same person points a finger at my personality or my character that is the only time I take it as an offence. I don’t give her a right. Nobody gives her the right to indulge in character assassination.”

Unnikrishnan deems the whole controversy unfortunate. He says, “I am not judging the quality of the film or the issues it raises. The problem is that these are very conservative and orthodox views on a woman, her body and her sexuality. If there is any such issue, it is the Censor Board that should take care of it, as a government appointed body. People outside of it shouldn’t be doing its job.”

And yet they are.