I have just finished watching She Season 1 and 2 on Netflix and am bowled over by Aaditi Pohankar’s performance. It is amazing the kind of subjects our writers are exploring and the performances of the actors. The three most significant character in the series are a prostitute, an underworld don and his right hand. The prostitute played by Aaditi is calm and unruffled. She is aware of her sexuality but does not over express it. She reminded of another actress, Antara Mali in the early 2000 who was ordinary yet attractive and sensual without attempting it. Antara quit films post marriage and nobody talked about her. Till I saw She and the similarity between Aaditi and Antara. I was propelled to revisit Antara’s old movies and consequently reread her old interviews. Aaditi Pohankar is outstanding no doubt but Antara Mali and the way she portrayed her sensuality was way ahead of her time.

Year: 2002: Antara Mali, daughter of ace photographer Jagdih Mali, made her debut in a small budget film called Doondte Reh Jaonge, it went unnoticed. Her second film, Dum Dum Diga Diga was shelved halfway, then came Telugu film, Prem Katha followed by Ram Gopal Varma’s Mast and a year later, Company.   She was a good actress and the media loved her but she never misused their affection, saying, “Just because I am my father’s daughter, I don’t have to get attention, at least not till I have proved my credentials.  People tell me I should not have started my career as a supporting artiste in Mast but I don’t regret the film even in my weakest moment. I loved my character Anjali and it was easy for me because I was playing my age. Company was definitely more complex but I loved playing the role.

These days all the South movies are made on multi-crore budgets and released in four languages (Hindi included). A week ago, it was Mashesh Babu produced and Adivi Sesh written-performed Major. The pre publicity of the film was tremendous but the Hindi version did not live up to the hype. The Telegu version, I hear is a super success but the producers   are still hopeful for the Hindi version. The latest to join the bandwagon is 777 Charlie.

Everywhere I go, people ask me why this sudden craze for South movies? My answer is the attraction always existed, only we were never aware of it. Superstar Shivaji Ganesh was always curious about what films Dilip Kumar was doing in the 50s and the 60s and Meena Kumari featured in almost all the remakes of Southern superstar Savitri. The superstars met each other if they were in their cities but there was no social media then, so the information was not public.

 In the 70s the copyright was not an issue as it is today and Rajnikant regularly rehashed all Bachchan super hits into Tamil blockbusters. Come 80s and South production houses got big time into Hindi films. They had made films in the past too but now our stars, Jeetendra, Rekha, Rajesh Khanna was parked in Madras for months! This was also the time when Sridevi and Jaya Prada were launched in Bollywood and the craze continued till the 90s. In 2000 Baahubali happened. Then Pushpa happened and then RRR and KGF 2. It has taken more than 100 years but finally, Indian cinema has blurred lines of languages and combined so Hollywood better watch out!

I wondered how come nobody protested against the rules, I mean how does a newcomer survive in the present scheme of the entertainment business? “It is not easy but there are no alternatives because the producers make the rules and we actors need work we keep so we quiet and the injustice continues”.

The problem with show business is that everything works in a loop. The show goes on till the music stops playing and until then nobody stops to question.! The current content obsession on OTT channels is a glaring example of this! The gamble began during the pandemic and even though covid is more or less out of our lives, the channels are still generating bulk content and at the same pace.  My question is who is absorbing all these serials on all these channels?  They all have a new release every Friday.

The cinema halls have minimum three releases every week because the pandemic has put all schedules awry. It is going to be a bottle neck at the theatres for a long time to come, so what confuses me is why are the OTT channels not taking a break? I mean seriously, who is their audience and when are they absorbing kilos of content published every week? Not the working class for sure, nor the homemakers and certainly not the youth who have a lot to catch up for the lost time.  How much content can even critics like me either because how much content can even a critic like me absorb because she has only one pair of eyes and 24 hours a day!!

Last week, there were eight releases (Hollywood, Bollywood and independent film) and not that critic like me reviewed all the films but the stress from all the PRs and the production houses and the emails in the inbox and what’s-up messages was killing! Call it the side-effects of covid but it is raining content in cinema halls and on OTT platform.!! The speed at which all the channels are churning shows and movies, I don’t think any actor or technician of merit will be without a job for a long, long time. The question is are all those engaged in the entertainment getting paid for their services or is it the same old waiting game?  

A TV actress I bumped into shared that the positive of the covid was that all auditions now happen online. The casting agency contacts them, sends them a brief and they shoot their videos accordingly. “No matter how brilliant you think you are in the audition there is a likelihood that the filmmaker will never see the shot because it is always the casting director who has the final say”.

A normal shift for a daily soap or even a film shoot is 12 hours a day but payment for both is released only after 90 days and there is a possibility of further delay from both. “This means if you are not having regular assignments, you are going to be without money for three months because in the current assignment money will start rolling only after six months. This is why actors are forever insecure,” concluded the actress.

To be continued

The most moving chapter of the book is when Nargis is detected with cancer. She was in Delhi attending the Rajyasabha session and suspected of having jaundice. She rushed home and was admitted to Breach Candy Hospital the same evening. The next morning, Sunil Dutt and Nargis left for New York. The following morning, she was admitted to Sloane Kettering Cancer Center and returned home only a year later, after innumerable surgeries and immensely frail.

It is not easy writing about a loved one but the daughters present a startling account of how their life fell apart after their mother’s demise. All the three children watched on hopelessly as Sunil Dutt broke down. He had braved it for too long but not any longer.  He was unable to rise above the tragedy and expected his elder daughter Namrata to run their home the way her mother did. Namrata couldn’t, nor could Priya, the youngest of the three and who was appearing for her tenth exams while supervising Sanjay in a rehabilitation clinic. All the children and their father were looking for an anchor and the anchor was gone!

The second time the family fell apart was when Sunil Dutt bid farewell. There is a moving account about the last hours of Sunil Dutt. On May 24 Sunil Dutt felt weak and exhausted because he had spent the entire day clearing his cupboards and packing his belongings. The family was shifting to their new home Imperial Heights in a few days’ time and he was looking forward to the grand house warming party planned by the family. On May 25 2005 when Sunil Dutt did not wake up at his usual hour, his staff contacted the children and even though all of them rushed by his side, Sunil Dutt had said farewell.

 concluded

The book on Nargis and Sunil Dutt was released more than a decade ago, but everytime I read it my eyes with tears. Published by Roli Mr & Mrs Dutt: Our Parents is a beautifully produced book with rare pictures and memories of the family. The 200 odd pages are divided into ten chapters, and the children diligently analyze the similarities and the contrasting qualities of their parents.

Both Nargis and Sunil Dutt were born in the year 1929. Nargis as Fatima in Calcutta to a Muslim mother Jaddanbai, a thumri singer and father Uttamchand Mohanchand, a Mohyal Brahmin. Sunil Dutt was born as Balraj Dutt in Khurd, Jhelum to landlord Devan Raghunath and his wife Kulwant Devi, both Mohyal Brahmins.

While Sunil Dutt faced a troubled childhood after his father passed away and his widowed mother had to endure many hardships to raise her three children, Nargis was raised in the lap of luxury and blessed with easy success. Both were unusually responsible from a very young age. If Nargis carried her personal staff, driver Kasam bhai and maid Ameena bai to her marital home and whom her children addressed as nana-nani, Sunil Dutt did everything in his ability to settle his younger siblings.

 To be continued

June is a month associated with Nargis and Sunil Dutt. Nargis died on 01 June and Sunil Dutt was born on 6 June and every year, around this time, I make it a point to read their biography Mr and Mrs Sunil Dutt Memories of our Parents penned by daughters, Namrata Dutt Kumar and Priya Dutt.

Nargis was14 when her mother launched her in Mehboob Khan’s 1943 Taqdeer. Sunil Dutt began his career as a radio jockey, interviewing film stars on Radio Ceylon before Ramesh Saigal gave him a break in the1955 Railway Platform. Everybody is aware of their dramatic love story triggered by a fatal fire on the sets of Mother India in 1957 when Sunil Dutt jumped into raging flames to save his heroine and won her heart.

In the late 70s I have attended the mahurat of Sanjay Dutt’s Rocky and in 1981 I have reported on Nargis’s funeral. Over the decades, the magazines I associated with conducted several photo-shoots with both Sunil and Sanjay Dutt and in the process interacted with the entire family, namely Namrata and Priya Dutt so years later, when the daughters launched a book on their parents, I was with the family to cheer them.

To be continued