Kissing comes to the screen

'F EW films have had such a ballyhoo as Raj Kapoor's Satyam Shivam Sundaram. At every stage of its pro- duction the multi-million rupee colossus has kept the tongues wagging within the film industry. Film magazines, kept at bay during the shooting, have

written snide articles condemning the film and its maker. Rival producers, concerned about the possible box-office competition the film will pose, are busy spreading stories that Raj Kapoor has lost his touch; and an eager public, their curiosity aroused by stories of eroticism and nudity in the film wait to see if SSS will prove a spectacular hit such as Bobby, or a flop like Mera Naam Joker. Zeenat Aman, universally regarded as an actress with little merit, hopes that the film will, at last, show the world her histrionic ability. And Raj Kapoor by his own admission, a dinosaur ill at ease in a modern era, knows that with this film he will either cement his position as the godfather of Indian cinema, or be relegated to the history books. J

Originally, the film was planned as a low budget "quickie" with unknown actors. Raj Kqpoor, his confidence strengthened by the run-away success of Bobby and the more modest, but substantial showing of his son Randhir's Dharam Karam, was unwilling to risk money spent on the Joker. He dusted off a 20-year old scenario about an ugly woman with a beautiful voice, fitted out a van for outdoor shooting and was all set to make an art film on location.

But as the idea evolved, Kapoor found himself injecting new themes and greater depth into the scenario. The old "beauty is only skin deep" conception gave way to a more complex, philosophical thesis: that reality is not necessarily solid and unchangeable but

THE KAPOO that perception is what dictates one's concept of reality. Moreover, he was also taken by the essential unity of truth, God and beauty- Satyam Shivam Sundaram.

While the merits of such philosophizing can be argued about ad museum, it is undisputed that transferring such concepts to the commercial Indian cinema requires either exceptional skill or a mastery of the art of selling. Kapoor discarded his original low- budget plan, and involved himself in working out a screenplay that included his philosophy. In the process, SSS was transformed into a prestigious, high-budget venture. As the word spread around that Raj Kapoor was casting his new film, actors and actresses all over Bombay began to send feelers to Kapoor's Chembur cottage.

To many people, Kapoor's standing in the industry is almost inexplicable. He has made three films in the last 15 years of which one was enormously unsuccessful, and two, though they clicked at the box-office, were hardly classics of their genre. Without exception, all the films he has acted in for concerns other than his own have been abysmal flops. Yet, such is Kapoor's prestige that actors and actresses vied with each other to be selected for SSS. In part, this was because the film is probably the only heroine-dominated vehicle to be made by a major studio in recent years. But there was more to it than that. Noted film historian Firoze Raneoonwala's " explanation is that stars are basically insecure people who like belonging to vast concerns such as R. K. Films. Others argue that Raj Kapoor is one of the few directors who is willing to devote himself to getting the best out of his actors. Parveen Babi, for exam- ple, feels that Kapoor "is one of the few people who is concerned with more than just profits-he wants to make a good film."

To Zeenat Aman, Satyam Shivam Sunahram represented an opportunity of a life time. While producers continued to line up outside her door with offers of roles, Aman was getting tired of playing the glamour girl in film after film. A new trend for action films had begun and in such films, heroines ended up getting short shrift, a love scene or two was the most they could hope for. Additio- nally, even her most ardent fans did not dare to claim that she was a good actress, and her critics were convinced that she was no more than a pretty face, useful for filling the background, but hardly enough to hang an entire film on.

Arnan decided to win the SSS role for herself. She saw Barsaat, Awara and other old Raj Kapoor films and arrived at Kapoor's doorstep to claim the part. By this time, Kapoor had decided to launch a search for an actress because he felt that none of the current crop of heroines could do justice to his conception of the character. Aman was probably the last person he would have thought suitable. The girl he had in mind had to be plain looking and willing to be made up to look scarred and burnt in the film-Aman was attractive, no great shakes as an actress and spoke Hindi with an accent. However, Aman refused to give up. She had herself made up to look scarred, dressed in a costume from the film and burst into his cottage one day. Flabbergasted, Kapoor rang his wife and said, "Come and see what this girl has done," Mrs Kapoor arrived with a gold coin to bless Zeenat, and Raj knew that he had found his heroine.

For the male lead, he signed his brother Shashi, whom he had last directed when he played the young Raj Kapoor in Awara and Shree 420. Character artistes such as Leela Chitnis, David and A. K. Hangal were added to the cast, and he was ready to shoot. Such is the magic of the Kapoor name that Aman and the rest of the cast agreed to act for far less than their normal rates because as Kapoor says, "So what if I pay them chicken-feed. They should be happy to act with me."

By this time, the script had been finalized. To put across his appearance, perception and reality theme, he had Zeenat Aman play an adivasi girl with a beautiful voice, and a bur ar t --

INDIA TODAY. NOVEMBEF 977

R EROTICA disfigured half her face. Shashi plays an engineer who hears thc voice, is enraptured by it and imagines that it belongs to a beautiful girl. When he finds Zeenat, she hides the disfigured part of her face and he is satisfied. They get married and on their wedding night, he discovers the scar. Convinced he has married the wrong mrl he leaves home. To make his point, Raj Kapoor then has has hi once again discover Zeenat on a cliff, where she again hides the scar. To Shashi, Zeenat becomes two different girls-his beloved, and his scarred wife-illustrating two different perceptions of the same reality. Shashi ignores his wife and has an affair with who he thinks is a different girl; inevitably Zeenat gets pregnant leading to compli- cations and a final denouement. The film ends on a positive note: perception and reality merging into one.

It is easy to make fun of such a plot and Kapoor fully expects film magazines to tear it to bits. The entire concept of a courtship where the man never sees the girl's face uro~erly is a little hard to 1 stomach; and despite the scar, ~ e e n a i man still looks quite recognizably like Zeenat Aman, making it unlikely that Shashi should not reconcile the two girls in his mind. Only Zeenat insists that the story is realistic. "It wouldn't happen anywhere else, but it can, and does happen in India," she argues unconvincingly. Raj Kapoor himself accepts that the plot is a little far-fetched but sees the film as an allegory wherc the theme is far more important than the story. "The theme came first," Kapoor says, "I had to build a story around it. But the story is only important to comrnunicatc the theme." He cites the instance of the ancient poet Surdas and insists that his intention is to convey the bcautv of the soul. whether one perceives it visually (the facej or aurallyv(the voice). ' Two perceptions oj'reafily-Zeenat Aman's two images

INDIA TODAY. NOVEMBER 1-1 5, 1977

What is not clear is whether audiences will perceive Kapoor reality rather than their own, fed as they are on escapist fare which demands no great exercise of inner vision. When Kapoor first planned SSS, he thought he was risking very little because it was to be a low budget production. However, now that the film has assumed gigantic proportions he is clearly nervous about its box-office prospects. "Once I got involved in the filming, I went all the way," he recalls, "I have never been able to cut corners and so the expenses kept mounting." Because he wished to avoid giving it a studio-made look, he shifted his entire unit to his farm at Loni. He spent over Rs 7 lakhs on constructing a temple to make the scenes of Zeenat singing there seem as realistic as possible. At the cost of several more lakhs, he constructed an entire village near Loni as he wanted to make the adivasi location seem more genuine than the usual cardboard-and- glue jobs put up in most studios. He refused to enlist starstruck bystanders to fill his crowd scenes because he felt that they were never relaxed enough to look natural: "There's always some fool nudging the other and saying, "look that's Shashi Kapoor." To overcome this, he transported hundreds of extras from Bombay, put them up and fed themat his own expense, and paid them their daily union rate (which is thrice the normal rate),-for location shooting. All this cost millions. But the film's climatic flood was both the most diflicult and the most expensive scene to film. As luck would have it, there were real floods at Loni last year. Unfortunately Zeenat was in America and Shashi was unavailable. When both his stars returned, Kapoor rigged up a massive rain-making apparatus consisting of five pumps that sprayed water, fire brigade hoses and introduced other technological wizardry. Once again, as there was no water on location, it had to be transported from a considerable distance at great expense. Raj Kapoor had his rainstorm but hib cheque book has still to recover.

Aside from such spectacular extravagance, Kapoor's very method of shooting is expensive. He refuses to shoot his film piece-

I The film's climaticJood-the most expensive scene

meal over a period of a year, arranging shootings when stars are available. As busy stars such as Shashi work three shifts a day (that is, three different shootings), such a process is both laboured and laborious. Raj Kapoor prefers to have his stars on hand for the entire shooting spell, and likes shooting continuously for several days. His cameraman Radhu Karmarkar is a painstaking per-, fectionist who often prolongs sessions by refusing to accept anything but the best. Kapoor himself is known for ordering retakes and

1 ZEENAT A M A N

I , WITH BODY AND SOUL W HILE the fate of Satyam Shivan?

Sundaram is not as important to Zeenat Aman as it is to Raj Kapoor, the 24-year-old actress also has a vast personal stake in the film's fortunes. To Aman, SSS represents a heaven-sent opportunity to silence once and for all her many critics. "I told Rajji once at Loni," she recalls, "that if the film flopped I was going to jump out of the nearest window. It means so much to me. Of course, Rajji said that he would accept all the blame for its failure. And all the credit for its success! That's fair enough. It's really his film all the way." Nevertheless, it is clear that should SSS emulate Bobby's success at the box-office, Aman will almost certainly sweep past an overweight Hema Malini to become the Hindi screen's leading actress. To date, most critics have argued that despite Aman's popularity, she is not as good an actress as Hema, and that, in any case, she is only suited to roles where she has to play a wester- nized glamour girl. If SSS succeeds, Aman will be in a position to repudiate both charges.

Most discussions about Aman tend to centre on her proximity to the top female star's position and ignore the fact that even her getting to be number two is no mean

achievement. Few people who saw Aman's debut in 0. P. Ralhan's Hulchuldreamt that she would ever become a star. It was not just that her role in Hulchul was a miniscule one designed to cash in on her Miss Asia tag. More to the point was the fact that Aman spoke no Hindi. She was an abysmal actress, looked "Anglo-Indian", and had hardly ever seen a Hindi film before. Aman herself saw no future in the film industry and was all set to emigrate to Germany to join her step-father, a Herr Heinz.

Aman's background is in itself very different from that of the average film actress. The daughter of a Muslim father and a Maharashtrian Hindu mother, she spent nine years at a boarding school in Panchagani. Her school mates remember her as "fat and bookish", and by her own account she excelled at academics and be- came a head girl. Her I.S.C. results won her a scholarship to the United States and Arnan did a year of high school in California. On her return to India, she modelled for a while and entered the Miss India contest. Both activities seem to have been inspired by a sense of independence. Aman and her mother hardly needed the money: they have always had two cars and continue to live in the

same well-appointed flat on Bombay's Napean Sea Road. The flop of Hulchul (which she agreed to do out of curiosity) hardly worried her, and she was not keen to seek a career in films. At least. not until she met Dev Anand.

Gossip columnist Devyani Chaubal has her own version of the first time Dev met Aman. According to her, Anand first saw Aman's strikingly attractive mother at the old Bombelli's cafe on Warden Road over 20 years ag&. Attracted by her looks, he instructed a flunkey to approach her. Mrs Aman was not fooled by the obliqueness of the approach. Looking straight at Anand, she asked the chamcha to inform his master that she was married.

Embarrassed at being found out, Dev hastily switched to an avuncular approach. To demonstrate the platonic nature of his in- tentions he busied himself in playing with the baby girl, Mrs Aman had left in a pram outside. "Little did Dev know," Devyani chortles, "that the baby would grow up to be Zeenat." Not surprisingly, Aman's ver- sion is somewhat different. She says that Dev saw her in trousers, with a cigarette in her hand, at a party and signed her up for Hare Rama Hare Krishna. The film's success led to more roles with him and their relationship is too well known to need retelling. Ironically, her later films with Anand did badly and she established her- self only because of the successful films she did for other directors. By the time she came

INDIA TODAY. NOVEMBER 1-15. 1977

filming again and again till he is satisfied. For SSS, he shunned arti- ficial lighting and shot each scene in natural light. This meant that a sunset sequences could only be filmed in the fifteen minutes it took the sun to set. Normally, it could be shot at any time of day, using special camera filters. This had the effect of ensuring that scenes most directors would finish in a day, took Kapoor at least a week.

Shashi Kapoor, because he is member of the Kapoor clan in addition to being the busiest star in films today, was not surprised by Raj's style of working. For Zeenat Aman, however, who is very much a '70s star, such an approach to film-making came as a sur- prise. Indicative of Kapoor's thorough approach was the scar she was made to wear in the film. To achieve the right effect, Kapoor studied horror films and searched for an effective bum make-up. Finally, he journeyed to Russia's Mosfilm Studios and obtained a supply of liquid latex not normally available in India, and along with makeup man Sarosh Modi worked on a mould of Arnan's face. Only after much experimentation was a suitable make-up evolved. Such thoroughness shook Aman initially, but after a while she says, "I began to get used to it. Rajji has an unique ability to make you feel at ease on the set. None of the I-am-Raj-Kapoor-and-you-are- a-nobody approach one might expect!". Kapoor himself says that Aman represented a challenge. "I took her," he recalls, "because she was enthusiastic and sincere. I was determined to get a good per- formance out of her. The first problem was language. Apart from a few scenes, I think she has lost that convent school inflection. I am happy with her performance on the whole-I think I have proved a voint." Raj Kapoor briefing Aman and Shashi on location

Kapoor sees S S S as being his challenge to the current crop of as a commercial film-maker. Good commercial films have been multi-star cast films. "Big budget today means money spent on made for less and even successful money-spinners have not required stars," he claims, "I have spent my big budget oh the film itself, not extravagance on this scale. Are Kapoor's films then no more than the stars." Few people will dispute his contention but there remains expensive exercises in self-indulgence? He does not shy away the all important question-why? As none of Kapoor's films are from answering this charge. He sees himself as a Stanley Kubrick- critical successes on the level of, say, Satyajit Ray, he must be judged like figure making commercial films of quality and adapting his

to ask Kapoor for the SSS roles, she had every bit of gossip. I find it easier to ignore learned Hindi and shot to the number two the stories." One story that she found she slot almost simultaneously. couldn't ignore was tard dust's claim that

Aman's association with Raj Kapoor she had an affair with a young, married d and SSS led to problems few veovle could assistant director to hurt his father. have predicted. -While h a n d had quite character artist Pran. "I was in ~ o n d o i happily reconciled himself to working with when the story came out," Aman recalls. other heroines after his films with Arnan "I spent the next two days on the inter- flopped, he took her approach to Kapoor national trunk lines trying to clarify things." as a personal slight. To him it appeared as Only the actresses seem to have it in though she was trading him in for a more for Aman. "If I were to take off my clothes commercial proposition and he was offended as often as she does," says one of Aman's that she should call Kapoor India's greatest rivals, "I'd be at the top too." Aman's director (evidently he has ambitions in that response is a tight-lipped "sour grapes", sphere himself). A scandal-hungry press but the criticism seems to rankle. Since eagerly leapt on to the bandwagon. h a n d Manoranjan where Shammi Kapoor kept was portrayed as the jilted lover and Aman the cameras trained on her body, Aman has typed as a cold hard woman with ice=water been thought of as the Hindi cinema's for blood and a cash register brain, who was "nude star". SSS, as the film stills show, is determined to reach the top even if it meant not going to help matters. Nevertheless littering studio floors with corpses of cast Aman sticks to her ground. "I played a off lovers. whore in Manoranjan," she points out, "I

Strangely, few of Zeenat's co-workers couldn't have played the role all buttoned recognize the caricature. Even Devyani Chau- up." As for SSS. "It's tastefully done bal agrees that the image is unfair. "Zeenat and the role demanded it." She does how- doesn't sleep around," she says, "she's ever claim that she will never appear fully a very pleasant person but I suppose that nude on screen. as sex sells, the magazines have to write "It isn't the money that keeps me here," this about her." The bad press is compounded insists Aman, "I've made en~ugh." How by Aman's stubborn refusal to discuss her much she willnot say but her price is reported private life. Indeed, she refuses to even to range from Rs 5 to Rs 7 lakhs. She makes confirm whether she had an affair with ten films a year. Now that she has made her him. "Look,': she says a little heatedly, money, Aman wants recognition as an "I've been linked with something like 20 actress. Raj Kapoor and SSS will, she men. usuallv at the same time. I can't denv horns. ~rovide that for her

INDIA TODAY. NOVEMBER 1-15, 1977

budget to suit the then just as Kubrick's Dr Strangelove was not overly expensive, nor was Kapoor's Bobby. On the other hand, Kubrick spent $11 million on Barry Lyndon, just as Kapoor has spent Rs 1.5 crores on SSS. Like Kubrick, he expects to recoup his investment in the long run. Distributors are not always convinced by such reasoning. Some of his old associates refused to take Bobby, and there is some resentment over the guarantee money they have had to pay for SSS. And yet, such is the structure of the lndian film industry that to be Raj Kapoor's distributor means status and prestige. Uniquely among Indian film-makers, Kapoor makes up their losses, should his film flop. But most of all, as one southern dis!ributor put it, "One day Raj Kapoor is going to make a super- hit, and I want to be there to clean up too."

Though he shies away from saying it, Kapoor obviously hopes that S S S will be that super-hit. He is apprehensive about audience reaction to Aman's scarred visage and the heavy nature of the theme, but feels that the film has other compensations. Chief among these seems to be Aman's scantily clad body. Kapoor insists that the eroticism is very tastefully done and that the censors should have no objection, but he is astute enough to realize that talk of nudity will pull in his audiences. "I am a commercial film-maker," he says a little defensively, "I don't make films for the New York film critics. I want the masses. I have to compromise." Part of the compromise

lies in the film's many fantasy sequences where Zeenat appears unscarred on what look like very filmi sets. (These sequences are the only ones filmed at R.K. Studios). Aman's choli also allows a gene- rous eyeful of her breasts in some scenes and her adivasi costume is obviously descended from Raquel Welch's scanty outfit in One Million B. C. "But you don't notice the nudity, it's so tasteful." Kapoor claims: "Some very conservative ladies told me that while they felt shaken to begin with, after a while, it seemed to recede and the theme became the important focus of the film." However, hc adds, with characteristic candour, "Let them come to see Zeenat's tits, they will go out forgetting her body and remember the film."

Hundreds of exhibitors and distributors hope that Kapoor is right. "This may well be my final fiing," he says withuncharacteristic nervousness. "If this film flops, everybody will forget me." Kapoor's hyperbole is pardonable, even though it seems unlikely that a single flop will finish off an institution. What is at stake is much more than just Kapoor's reputation. Satyam Shivam Sundaram represents a rare experiment within the commercial cinema circuit. It dares to look at the female form as the sculptors of Ellora must have gazed on it: recognizing its artistic beauty not with snide self-conscious- ness but boldly, with a quickening of the pulse. If the censors' scissors start cutting, they may halt a vital step in the evolution of lndian cinema from juvenile vulgarity to adult artistic values.

RAJ KAPOOR

AJ KAPOOR is the last of the great movie moghuls. Brought up in an era when Shantaram, Mehboob, Kardar and other

)big-time producers dominated the film world, Kapoor consciously attempt- ed to do his own thing. "I was totally in awe of my father," he recalls. "I decided when I was very young that I would be like him., It wasn't enough just being an actor. He was an institution in the theatre. So I made films that were different and inno- vative, built myself a studio, collected a team of musicians, cameramen, soundmen-every- one required for making a film ; and that is how Raj Kapoor became an institution." Like a Moghul king he speaks in the third person.

In his heyday Kapoor made films that were different and yet managed to pull the crowds. He was, for example, the first to shoot in Kashmir, the man who introduced novelty of foreign locations with Sangam, and the only Indian producer to risk a major film on two unknown young actors (Bobby). Despite such daring forays off the beaten track, Kapoor remained a highly successful commercial film-maker? a man who has tasted failure only once, and that too, in keeping with his flamboyance, it had to be a spectacular failure!

Today with a g Kapoor has mellowed. He looks older than his 53 years and lapses all too often into nostalgic memories of days long gone by. Unkind film columnists say that he has entered his "anecdotage", and the new breed of "hustlers" who have taken over the industry dismiss him as, "a showman who hasn't realized that the show is over". What was earlier seen as involvement-his projection of his own personality in his - - 34

ART 4 films-is now seen as egotism and self- indulgence. Kapoor himself is not uncon- scious to the changes the industry has undergone. He laments the end of personal cinema and criticizes the formula most new films seem to be based on. "What is there in it?" he asks. "They sign up six big stars, throw in a cabaret, a smuggler, flashing lights and a big fist fight at the end. Where is the spontaneity our films used to have?"

And yet, Kapoor is realistic enough to

Kapoor-"let them come to see Zeenat's tits, they will go out forgetting her body

and remember the,filmW

admit that all of this is part of a worldwide trend. "All the major Hollywood studios,'' he points out, "are being converted into apartment blocks. Only Universal survives, but then it makes hackneyed television films. People like me are out of date every- where."

It is to his lasting credit that he combines this awareness with a determination not to give in to the new order. Satyam Shivam Sundaram is perhaps the biggest gamble of its kind any producer has undertaken in recent years, and Kapoor knows it. He says : "I am not going to make a multi-star cast action film just because everybody else is doing it. That has never been Raj Kapoor's style."

At 21, he had already produced and acted in his first major film Aag. And even though it was sold to distributors at a loss (something Kapoor harps on even to this day), its success established him as a force to be reckoned with. In a sense it gave him the impetus required to produce Barsaat, one of the most successful films of the 1940s. "I cannot quite explain what a phenomenon Barsaat was," says film historian Froze Rangoonwalla. "I have never seen such crowds at cinema halls. The photography was superb, Shanker-Jaikishen were in excellent form, Lata Mangeshkar established herself with that film, and Raj Kapoor suddenly sky- rocketed to the top of the industry." Some- what derivative of the techniques Orson Welles had introduced with Citizen Kane, Barsaut set the tune for almost all the film that followed it.

Somehow, Kapoor's peers tended to dismiss his acting talents. When Khwaja Ahmed Abbas took the script of a "father and son" film to be called Awara to Mehboob Khan, he accepted the scenario but refused to hire Kapoor insisting instead on Dilip Kumar. Abbas, who had written the screen- play with Prithviraj and Raj Kapoor in mind, refused to sell it to Mehboob. When Kavoor

INDIA TODAY. NOVEMBER 1-15. 1977

Raj Kapoor, 53-year-old godfather of the Zndian screen, has always prided himself on being an innovater ; a man who would rather take an outrageous gamble than follow the established commercial rut most Indian Jilm-makers prefer to

INDIA TODAY. NOVEMBER 1-15. 1977

wallow in. His Satyam S hivam Sundaram, planned for release next month is by far his biggest gamble to date. Starring. Shashi Kapoor and sultry sex goddess Zeenat Aman, Kapoor's film is expected to rock the Indian film world by its sheer

innovation. He has demolished all accepted Indian film norms by permitting kissing on the screen, a phenomenon tabooed all these years. It is an art form, he argues. The film-makers in India, he says, must educate the public, to accept nudity as

an art form. Raj Kapoor, despite his idealism, obviously wants the art form to have commercial viability. I f the censors accept his argument, the Zdian film industry will take a leap from juvenile escapism depicted in the films at present to adult artistic values.

INDIA TODAY. NOVEMBER 1-15. 1977

heard this, he rushed to Abbas and bought the story. Prithviraj, who was then an established screen hero, refused to play tile hero's father,saying, "I arnnot acharacter artist." Abbas finally won him over by saying, "You will play the hero, Raj will play the hero's son." Awara marked the beginning of a professional relationship between Kapoor and Abbas that survived the flop of the Joker and ultimately gave rlse to the money spinning Bobby. It was also the start of what many people see as Kapoor's Chaplinesque phase, complete with funny walk, mixture of pathos and slapstick, and in a few cases actual sequences lifted from Chaplin's films. Kapoor himself concedes the-similarity but argues that his tramp was "essentially Indian. Unlike Chaplin, I romanticized the character to the extent that people could identify with him." Awara remains, even today, a gxeat hit in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe where Kapoor has almost become a folk hero.

Throughout the 1950s Kapoor remained at the top of his profession, making success- ful films such as Shree 420 and by now having a legendary affair with the actress Nargis. Firoze Rangoonwalla dates Kapoor's decline to Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai. While the film proved to be a sensational success, it's theme pre-empting the Indian police's reformation of dacoits by several years, Rangoonwalla argues that the film marked a stepdown in Kapoor's standards as a director. Sangam, which followed, was even more successful, although it was hardly a great film. Its plot was an updating of Mehboob's Andaz. Sangam was the first Indian film to capture the West Asian market and a dubbed version was shown for over a year in Teheran. Sangam also demonstrated Kapoor's willingness to be overshadowed-a rarity among actor-direc- tors. Rajendra Kumar, who "sang" some of the film's best songs, assured a place for himself in the hearts of female moviegoers. It was Rajendra Kumar who was regarded as the film's hero all over West Asia-not Kapoor.

Mera Naam Joker is probably one of the most discussed flops in the history of Indian cinema. The film lost roughly Rs 80 lakhs, (Kapoor himself was poorer by Rs 56 lakhs) making it perhaps the most costly disaster of its time. Originally the film was to have six episodes documenting the life and loves of a circus clown. Abbas admits he wrote the script with Kapoor's career in mind, and several instances in the film, such as the Christian school-teacher episode, are known to have parallels in the director's life. Kapoor now says that he saw the film as an allegory and intended to project his own attitudes and philosophy if not his biography. As it turned out, he approached each episode as though it was a separate film, causing the whole project to lose much of its continuity. He shot the third episode first (though it was not intended to be r h , I,,+\ L,,-..r- DnA-Z-; --A Dn:--Ar,.

Dimple-the one who got away

Kurnar were available. By the time he got to the first episode, he was behind schedule and over the budget. Moreover, the film ran for five hours. The distributors insisted on cutting it to 3 hours 45 minutes- 15 minutes less than Sangam. It was released amidst much publicity and fanfare. Audiences expected a comedy-it was called the Joker. But instead they found three diverse themes strung together only by Kapoor's self-pro- jection and an air of gloom and self-pity. "NO film with such diverse themes had ever succeeded:'says Rangoonwalla, "and there was no reason for Joker to reverse the trend. Only Raj Kapoor liked the challenge." Today Kapoor admits as much. While he still rates the film highly, as do the critics, he admits that the clown, who makes vulgar gestures to amuse the crowd between trapeze acts and lion trainers, was totally unsuited to Indian conditions. Besides, he adds, "Nobody loves a loser. In all my other films I got somewhere in the end. Here I lost out."

Kapoor's first failure left him both depressed and broke. The industry had changed during the time it took him to make the Joker and a new kind of assembly-line production had come into vogue. Unable to adapt himself to actors who worked on three different film sets every day, Kapoor refused to make a commercial film in the traditional style. Instead, Abbas wrote for him a love story which was made into a film with his son and an unknown teenage actress. While Bobby was dismissed by the critics, it raked in the money Kapoor desperately needed. Today he claims that "had it flopped, people would have called it a classic," and variously attributes its inspira- tion to Zefferelli's Romeo and Juliet.

Bobby restored Kapoor's lost prestige among the film-makers. This proved that it was not necessary for him to face the camera for his films to succeed. Kapoor, in fact, is a better director than an actor.

directors have succeeded. Around the World was an expensive disaster and Sapnon ffi Saudagar, despite Hema Malini, was an appalling film that crashed. at the box- office. Kapoor's explanation: "Those directors were fools. They didn't know a damn thing about film-making." Why then did he accept the roles?-"Money. Like Orson Welles, I had to act in bad films to make good ones myself."

One lilm he did make for another director was Basu Bhattacharya's Teesri &am. But it failed. Kapoor, however, dismisses both Bhattacharya and the film: "Basu is a pseudo, and I didn't like the film. He was risking somebody else's money. What did he have to lose?" fairness, it must be added that Kapoor is reported to have given the director a lot of trouble by refusing to turn up for shootings.

Hema Malin. ,,,.,rday's dream girl

SSS is Kapoor's second major venture in which he has not acted. Typically, he has risked all the money he made from Bobby on SSS which is even more expensive than Joker. Says Kapoor: "Film-making is a big gamble. None of this penny pinching for me." Should SSS fail, he will probably need to pull another Bobby out of the hat to survive. But should the film succeed, he is already considering various possibilities.. One projected venture involves a film about an Indian who falls into the Jhelum, ends up on the Pakistani side and falls in love with a Pakistani girl. Whether the lilm ever gets made will be d e t d e d by political circum- stances. Kapoor is also keen to see Randhir, his elder son who is himself a fine director and a very underrated actor, succeed. But most of 41, should SSS consolidate his position, Kapoor would - probably love nothing better than to make the three remaining chapters of Joker and prove to the world that his original concept can be

TI:.. C L..J

INDIA TODAY, NOVEMBER 1-15. 1977

Fanning The Flames Bombay's ace gossip columnist, Devyani Chaubal, writes on Raj Kapoor's leading ladies:

T HE massive Lord Shiva in chalk white plaster, atop R. K. Studios, has heavy busts. Down below in the dressing rooms of the studio, designers are busy stuffing leading

ladies' bras with cotton wool, rubber and foam. For Raj Kapoor's leading ladies, two things are a must: They must have heavy busts and they must be in love with Raj Kapoor. Vyjanthimala had small busts so they were covered with foam, Zeenat Aman is not in love with Raj Kapoor, so she pretends to be.

Kapoor was already married when he made his fist film Aag with three leading ladies-Kamini Kaushal, Nigar Sultana, Nargis. Out of the passion and flames of Aag, Kapoor gathered Nargis in his arms and hoisted her high on the R. K. banner. With violin in one hand and Nargis in the other he became the symbol of true love. After Barsaat, Awara, Shri 420 and Jagte Raho, the pair became the Indian screen's most immortal love legend. The Indians were passionately discussing the Raj-Nargis ishk kahani. The Russians, on the other hand, sincerely believed that Kapoor and Nargis were husband and wife, until he received a happy wedding anniversary telegram from his wife, Krishna, during one of his visits to Moscow.

In fact, it was in the land of vodka and the Volga that the Raj-Nargis myth was blown out. It was in Moscow that Nargis felt that Raj had taken her for granted and that he was watching Padmini with unusual curiosity. Nargis married Sunil Dutt, left

Three faces of Raj Kapoor's passion-Zeenat Aman (above), Nargis and Vyjanthimala (below)

films and never again spoke to Kapoor. Today, she prefer: to call him "that horrible man".

Nargis, daughter of a singing woman, had honest, almond eyes. She was tall and slim. She attended Queen Mary School in Bombay, and spoke fluent English. The English bit has always impressed Kapoor. The other day while watching an old RK film, he told Zeenat: "Don't think you are the only convent-educated girl. Thirty years ago, I had a leading lady who wore jeans, spoke English and used French perfume." In fact, all his leading ladies- Nargis, Padmini, Vyjanthi, Simi, Dimple and Zeenat-speak Engl- ish and have impeccable manners.

The tongues wagged much after Nargis left Kapoor. People predicted his doom. The emotional let-down suited him so well that Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai was a bigger hit. Padmini, com- pared to Nargis, was short, top-heavy and coarse with a froggy voice. But she was the new sex-symbol of R.K. Once more there were rumours of another romance. One day Padmini declared her marriage to a doctor and left. She quit films to settle in the US.

Then came the last flame of R. K. banner, Vyjanthimala. She had made jubilee hits with both Dilip Kumar and Rajendra Kumar. The orthodox, puritan, vegetarian and over-confident Vyjanthi was swept off her feet by Raj. The affair that spanned Europe with stopovers in the Alps, almost seemed a remake of the original Raj- Nargis love story. Raj who liked his women with shampooed hair and Worth perfume, tolerated Vyjanthi's Ramtirth Bramhi-oiled braid, and her peculiar herbal body smell. Vyjanthi, the Iyengar Brahmin, in turn accepted his lips reeking of whisky and masala murgi. The remake looked so real that Krishna, who had passed off Padmini as a harmless cow, took refuge in hotels and hospitals.

Kapoor is an exhibitionist and cannot keep anything to him- self. He likes to be seen with his women, in a darbar full of people. Little did he realize that his dearest friend, Dr Bali, watched the women at thedarbar with interest. Whilehe wasin London to process Sangam, he entrusted Vyjanthi to Dr Bali. The doctor, apart from being charming and well-dressed, was a trainee in the R. K. Studios. He grew fond of Vyjanthi and she responded. It turned out to be sangam in reality with Kapoor singing Dost Dost Na Raha. However I think that it is Dr Bali whom Kapoor misses more than Vyjanthi. To this day Vyjanthi has not spoken to Kapoor. She refers to him as "that old fool". Both Nargis and Vyjanthi survive in his memory through their portraits in his cottage.

Simi, who followed Vyjanthi, in Mera Naam Joker, never made it to the wall. She was the clinging type and too smooth. One day like his other leading ladies, she too got married. But her fatal mistake was to hang around. Today, the R. K. camp, forgets even to include her on Kapoor's birthday party list despite her telephone inquiries about the party.

By the time Dimple became R. K.'s leading lady, Kapoor had surrendered his image as a romantic hero to his son Chintu.

There is another characteristic about all his leading ladies. They may curse and condemn him, but they all jump into a barren valley of frustration after him. For them he is the ultimate. After him there is no other love or profession. Just mundane things like respectability, marriage, security. Therein lies the secret of Kapoor's charm. He is, for them, an experience and fantasy. The stars want to be part of that fantasy. So when a Zeenat Aman, dressed in ragged clothes, broke into Kapoor's cottage and touched his feet to ask for a role in Satyam Shivam Sundararn, it inspired her rivals like Vidya Sinha to say: "Who cares for Raj Kapoor."

Even little known starlets like Nivedita, on the R. K. payroll for seven years waiting for a suitable role that she never got, or Neetu Singh, again on the payroll waiting for a role in Bobby, which Dimple bagged, do not regret the long wait on the brink of fantasy. And Kapoor knows this. That is one reason why he never makes an exclusive contract with any of his leading ladies. He feels that he may change his mind before the women.

He enjoys every bit of his love life simply merely because a woman is part of his only passion-the films. He enjoys the union. He enjoys the separation and the walkouts. His image as the jilted 1n.r- ;.a ntnmsl

INDIA TODAY. NOVEMBER 1-15. 1977