COVER STORY

The national award winning 49-year-old actor says that when he was in the capital and had the opportunity to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and talk about his forthcoming film Toilet: Ek Prem Katha , he was overjoyed when the title of the film brought a smile on Mr. Modi’s face. “His smile at just the title made my day!” he exults. The film, directed by Shree Narayan Singh, is based on a love story against the backdrop of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan. Toilet: Ek Prem Katha also stars Bhumi Pednekar, Anupam Kher and Sana Khan. The actor tells JYOTHI VENKATESH that his film talks about sanitation and the dire need to have a toilet in every household to reduce health issues among women and children who are extremely prone to the unhealthy environment due to unhygienic open defecation.

 

Your latest film Toilet-Ek Prem Katha gives us a strong social message of sanitation at the backdrop!
The film sets out to send the strong message of PM Narendra Modi’s ‘Swach Bharat’ campaign and dignity of women. In the film, I play the role of Keshav who expresses his desire to get married to his father, who agrees but first marries me off to a buffalo so that the ill effects in my kundali is wiped out. One day, I come across a beautiful girl Bhumi Pednekar (Jaya) and fall in love. We get married and now the real problem starts, defecation. Jaya, who is a progressive thinker and comes from a well to do family shocked to learn in the first morning after marriage that she has to defecate in the open with the other ladies of the village.She revolts against this evil social system and I stand by her side as a strong pillar of strength. I go against all the villagers including my father to eradicate this evil social system, when the villagers are dead against having a toilet in the compound of their houses. The film then takes a politician turns and I and Jaya fight against the society for proper sanitation at home. ‘Toilet-Ek Prem Katha’ highlights the importance of sanitation in rural areas.

What do you think when you look back at your career?
When I look back at my career, I just cannot imagine that I have completed over 125 films as an actor having started with Pramod Chakraborty’s Deedar opposite Karisma Kapoor two and a half decades ago, though Saugandh directed by Raj N Sippy was my first film to be released.

You worked as a waiter in Bangkok!
To reach the position in which I am finding myself today, I have really slogged hard. Not only did I work as a waiter cum cook at a small restaurant in Bangkok where I remember I had pasted Sridevi’s poster on the small cup board in my small living room, as I was her ardent fan but also assisted photographer Jayesh Sheth in his photo sessions with all the stars just to get to know the film industry closely.

“When I look back at my career, I just cannot imagine that I have completed over 125 films as an actor.”

Did it never strike you that you should learn acting?
After completing 125 films as an actor and my films even notching up more than 100 cr, I may be in the league of 100 cr plus actors today but to me what matters more is the goodwill that I have with the people. It is thanks to my producers and fans that I have been able to be what I am today. I will always keep in mind this fact. I remember during my struggling days when I used to earn a very meager income, I once had gone to a pavement book seller in Flora Fountain and browsed through a book on acting but after I read the first line of the book, I decided not to splurge my money on it. You know what was written there? If you are a good human being, you can be a good actor too.

You are a Punjabi. What made you learn Marathi?
It was my determination and the decision to take up a challenge to avenge my humiliation by a BEST conductor that made me learn Marathi fluently after I came to Mumbai as a struggler 25 years ago. I was standing inside a bus when I was just Rajeev Hari Om Bhatia and finding ways and means of getting to Bollywood in a big way.One day the conductor kept on shouting at the top of his voice telling me Pudhe Chal Pudhe Chal but I did not react to him and continued to keep standing where I was in the bus, which angered him all the more. I did not follow Marathi as I was new to Mumbai then and I thought that maybe he was yelling out to someone else and was immersed in my thoughts when this conductor chided me and asked me why I was not moving ahead.It occurred to me only then that Pudhe Chala Re means Aage Badho. I was so humiliated when everyone else in the bus laughed at me at my lack of awareness of the local language I decided to make amends and not let anyone else deride me for not knowing Marathi and started learning Marathi

You have not only also acted but also produced a film in Marathi!
A day also dawned when I became so proficient in Marathi that I even acted in a Marathi film called Aadhar with Jaya Prada as my co-star for a director friend of mine called Mahesh Tilekar. Not only that, it was thanks to my interest in the language that I was also motivated to produce a Marathi film called 72 Miles Ek Pravaas which was appreciated at international film festivals all over the world.

Does your son Aarav watch your films?
My son Aarav watches all my films but he told me that he liked me in Holiday. He is brutally frank and sometimes tells me that I am bad in such and such a film, if he does not like it. I am glad that I had bought the rights for the remake of the Tamil film Thuppaki even before it was decided that I would produce Holiday, when A.R. Murugadoss came to me with the subject and wanted me to act in the film. I look for a different script every time, because I like taking risks as an actor. I remember when I decided to produce Oh My God and act in it without a heroine, people warned me it would not run, because I was tackling a controversial subject by my gamble paid off.

What do you keep in mind when you put money in a project as a producer?
If you do not know what your script is, automatically the cost of your film will soar high. What is the point if you shoot a film for 200 days when you can shoot it in 50 days? It is like asking your tailor to stitch a short for you after giving him 4 meters of cloth when you can make it in 2.25 meters easily. Do you know that Tom Cruise made Mission Impossible in just 47 days, because he had the script on hand before he went on the floors? Is there a single film in Bollywood which is bigger than Mission Impossible?

“I decided to make amends and not let anyone else deride me for not knowing Marathi and started learning Marathi. “

What makes you tick as an actor amidst competition?
I am still very greedy as an actor for good roles. Consciously I lost 10 kilos for my role in Brothers in which I played the lean elder brother of Sidharth Malhotra because he had gained 10 kilos and I had to present an athletic body and look weak though I played his elder brother.

In what way has the action scenario changed over the years?
Today the times are different and there is not much risk when a producer sets out to make an action packed film unlike in the past because the producer insures the film as well as the actor, who is playing the risky role in his film. Action has changed over the years and is well groomed now though it was very raw earlier. When I used to jump from choppers, air bags were never there. In Aawara Paagal Deewana, it was I who introduced the cable. I prefer to do action on my own as I enjoy doing such roles.

How do you keep the actor in you alive?
It is every actor’s hunger and thirst to do different types of roles instead of getting typecast.You will not see me at all in similar kinds of roles. As an actor, I have to diversify all the time, as I feel that if you are repetitive, the media will be the first to catch you and chide you. That is the reason I keep on producing as well acting in different genres of films. Though you do not always get a wonderful script like Oh My God at your doorstep, I was lucky I was able to do films in dynamically different roles like in Entertainment, Gabbar Is Back, Baby, Airlift and Rustom.

How would you describe yourself as a producer?
As a producer, I do not want to play safe and produce only formula based films with an eye on the box office. After Jolly LLB 2, my next film as a producer is Toilet Ek Prem Katha, which is also an entirely different film altogether. I am extremely confident about my other films like Neeraj Pandey’s Crack, Reema Kagti’s Gold, R. Balki’s Padman etc.

“Action has changed over the years and is well groomed now though it was very raw earlier.”

What suggestion do you have for the government?
I hope the government makes martial arts a compulsory subject for every student in every school, because I feel that knowing martial arts will help the students much more than knowing what sodium nitrate is. I make it a point to train students in martial arts in my academy for three years and send them abroad for further training.

What ails Indian Cinema today?
We have content in India, though unfortunately we do not have the kind of budgets that Hollywood makers have at their disposal to make a Godzilla. Abroad, they make a film with a budget of 135 million dollars. It is creditable that in our country, producers have trust in themselves and go ahead and make films with a lot of conviction

How do you see to it that your releases do not cut into one another?
Ideally, I’d like to have at least a five month gap between my releases If I want, I can easily set out to manipulate but I do not though it is the actor’s word at the end of the day. When it comes to the date of release of my films, I do not believe in pressurizing the corporates which are releasing my films because they know their job well and when they zero in on one particular date to release your film, you just simply cannot tell them to postpone or prepone the date of release. I do not want to have a conflict with any producer of mine and hence do not argue with them. They have put in crores of rupees on the film and have studied the game thoroughly.

On what basis do you choose your heroines?
Frankly, it is the director who decides which heroine will work opposite me. I do not take the final call. I have worked with several new actresses. I was Bipasha’s leading man in her first film Ajnabee, Priyanka Chopra’s hero in her first film Andaaz. I worked with Sonakshi Sinha in Rowdy Rathod and Holiday, Tamannah Bhatia in Entertainment and Tapsee Pannu in Baby and Naam Shabana.Mouni Ganguly is my leading lady in Gold.

Are you open to be part of a sex comedy?
I am not averse to doing any kind of a film, including a sex comedy. Sex comedy is a good genre. I was part of Garam Masala long before Masti or Grand Masti or even Great Grand Masti came up. It is after all just a film and you are only doing a character. It does not mean that you turn a sex maniac and vulgarity does not become part of your life if you set out to do a sex comedy.

Is your wife Twinkle contemplating on staging her comeback as an actress in films?
Tina has her own life. When I asked Tina recently, she confessed to me that she has no plans to stage her comeback as an actress. Today she is so busy as a writer that she does not have time even to read the scripts that I get.

Do you plan to induct your son Aarav and daughter Nitara too as actors?
I want my son Aarav and daughter Nirav to lead normal lives. It is too early for us to decide on what exactly they would become. Right now, Nirav is too small and Aarav is happy in his space in school. Tina and I are also proud that Aarav has won a gold medal in Judo.