AMITABH BACHCHAN
The other day I was speaking to a twenty-five-year-old actor and she hadn’t heard of Guru Dut’s Kaagaz Ke Phool paper flowers a classic movie dating back to 1959,. He laughs in the much-cloned baritone which has narrated epics and energized public service campaigns. Amitabh Bachchan- actor superstar, role model sexy dad and loving granddad- is probably the only person Bollywood who connect generations and blend clashing cultures.
At sixty-four he has acted over 150 films since his debut in 1969, in marxist writer-director K. A. Abbas Saat Hindustani. If he was the sombre police officer who wanted to avenge his parents death in his career-defining Zanjeer (The Chain 1973) written by Salim Khan and Javed Akhtar he was an urbane officer and a gentlemen in Javed’s son Farhan Akhtar’s Lakshay 2004, and co-starred with Salim’s Son Salman Khan as the polished patriarch in Baghban 2004, and Baabul 2006,. If he was the thwarted romantic poet Yash Chopra’s Kabhi Kabhi 1976, he was the unbending father in Yash’s son Aditya Chopra’s Mohabbatein Love stories 2000, a movie that put him back on the Bollywood map, not as an egeing leading man, that most pathetic of stereotypes but as an elder statesman who redefined cool. If he was a mere novice when he acted as a deaf-mute in Sunil Dutt’s Reshma Aur Shera 1971, he was a reluctant member of a gang of robbers with Sunil’s son Sanjay Dutt in Kaante Thorns, 2002.
At his suburban bungalow Jalsa which is a must-see in every tourist’s ride through Juhu an area much favoured by old-time stars Bachchan’s office is the never center of an empire which runs 2000 after a five-years hiatus during which his company, ABCL ( Amitabh Bachchan Corporation Ltd) went bankrupt Bachchan has enjoyed success and now makes over 35 crore a year from about ten products he endorses and about Rs. 3 crore a movie. He has just come off over 300 episode of Kaun Banega Crorepati, India’s version of the popular game show Who wants to be a Millionaire a Programme that propelled star Plus a Rupert Murdoch-owned television channel to the top of television ratings. Bachchan who symbolized the Angry Young Man of the enormously rebellious 1970’s an era characterized by Indira Gandhi’s shrill socialism followed by the Janata Party’s empty promise of democratic change, now embodies an India that straddles both its own traditional and the modernity of the West with an ineffable ease.
Born in Allahabad to a prominent Hindi poet and his social-activist wife he has changed many avatars-once the buddy of Congress Prime minister Rajiv Gandhi’s he is now close to the party bitter rival whether it is as modern Hindi cinemas biggest anti-hero Gabbar singh in a 2007, remake of the 1975 classic Sholay or as a washed out alcoholic teacher who saves a deaf and blind girl from doom in Black 2005, As he says I want to play my age, not superhuman stuff. I don’t want to be Superman or Spiderman.”
For Bachchan dubbed a one man industry at the height of his success in 1980 the second innings has coincided with the influx of a generations of directors who gave grown up watching his films. Whether it is Ram Gopal Verma, who has directed him in Sarkar, Nishabd, and Ram Gopal Verma ke sholay, or Milan Luthria’s who directed him in Deewar. 2004, brave new Bollywood has cut its teeth on his cinema. And it’s only directors. Even actors Shah Rukh Khan who is most often compared to Bachchan in terms of popularity and brand value, says he agreed to act in the remake of Don 2006, when Farhan Akhtar told him he would be able to say one of Khan’s favourite lines as an adolescent” Don Ko Pakadna Mushkil Hi Nahin Namumkin hai, Bachchan himself remains humble happy to be working willing but careful about his image nonetheless. Every day before he goes to sleep usually after midnight Bachchan examines the news clippings of the day reading whatever has been written about him and his family his son Abhishek Bachchan now one of Bollywood’s rising young star his wife actress and member of parliament Jaya Bhaduri Bachchan and now his daughter-in-low actress Aishwarya Rai. He has battled an accident in 1982 that left him dead a persistent nervous illness which he has to keep under control with medication and corporate which saw him so broke he had to mortgage his Juhu house. His approach to life has been philosophical after every fall he just gets up and starts over again and inspirational. It is not for nothing that he is known as a legend a chocolate film in trouble with the same ease with which he exhorts parents to send their children for polio vaccinations in a government campaign. As the man who has battled tremendous odds in his career of almost perhaps his perpetual pessimism can be forgiven: Bachchan appeals to a young India that marvels at his bilingual skills as much as his youthful attachment and to a greying India that cut its teeth on his diverse movie, If he can still burn up the dance floor in a hot stepping Punjabi wedding song Shava Shava in Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham 2001, he can also lust after diamonds and dishy women with equal fervour in Boom 2003. As a young modern India grows up, he shown it how to remain buoyant at heart and as an old India grows older, he shows it how to do it amazing grace. Charitable to paupers and charming to princes at ease as India’s international ambassador and at home in dusty villages, in informed gatherings and at glittering bashes he is a man for all season and a star for every reason.