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on 2007/7/27 4:02:34
And you thought you knew all about Badshah Khan! Come August 9 and someone would reveal all those untold secrets of the 'cocky star', who has attained a kind of 'thairav'.
I haven’t penned 70,000 words gushing on Shah Rukh Khan,” is how film critic and author Anupama Chopra sums her latest book, King of Bollywood: Shah Rukh Khan and the Seductive World of Indian Cinema.
Yes, yet another biography on SRK hits the stands on August 9. But Chopra, who counts this as her third book on cinema assures this one is different, “It’s an exploration and introduction to the Hindi film industry through the life and times of Shah Rukh Khan.”
Incidentally, the idea of the book was planted within Chopra much before the release of the other books on the actor.
“When I was working on my book on Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge for the British Film Institute, I really got fascinated by Shah Rukh and the way he has shaped contemporary Bollywood. My book on him grew out of that. It is a critical evaluation of his impact on and contributions to the Hindi film industry,” she says, adding that her biggest challenge was structuring the book as “it takes on the big picture of the film industry and India, while simultaneously portraying a detailed picture of the man. It starts from the pre-partition era in the Peshawar galli, where his ancestors hailed from and which was also home to Prithviraj Kapoor and Dilip Kumar and ends with Bollywood occupying a global space.”
Chopra, however, assures that there still are many unknown facts about the much-written actor that people will get to know in her book.
“For instance, I didn’t know that Shah Rukh’s father too for a small period did come to Mumbai and tried to become an actor and that Shah Rukh’s first film was in which Annie gives it those ones made by Arundhati Roy and Pradip Kishen in 1988,” says the author, who as a film journalist has interviewed Khan for over a decade.
“He was just one of the crowd in most scenes and played a character called Senior in the film set in an architectural college,” she informs.
Ten years hence, she observes a kind of “thairav” in the “cocky” star. “He is less cocky than what he was when I first interviewed him in 1996. But he’s still quick on the uptake and always guarantees great lines,” she sallies.
Quiz the film critic on that one SRK film that could be called a contemporary classic and she “undoubtedly” picks DDLJ. “It has a certain innocence with a warm heart. It’s not a manipulative film and is an honestly told story. That’s why it still connects with people. That apart the whole Raj-Rahul series too is going to be representative of our films from a particular era in years to come,” she says.
So has SRK given his nod to the bio? “He is very supportive but I can’t definitely call him my best friend. As regards the book, he has read parts of the manuscript and hasn’t asked me to change a single line,” signs off Chopra.
