Producing Bollywood: Inside the Contemporary Hindi Film Industry (32 page)

The stark difference between stars and the rest on a film set are a material manifestation of the tremendous power that they wield within
filmmaking, specifically in the conceptualization stage. It is important to note that all actors are not categorized as “stars” by the Hindi film industry, which has a particular taxonomy of actors related to narrative presence, commercial success, career trajectory, and tenure within the industry.
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Furthermore,
celebrity
is not synonymous with stardom within the industry. Since 1996, at any given point of time, only about five to six actors are deemed top stars by the industry, based on their box-office draw and performance. Thus, stars are those select actors who not only essay the roles of male and female protagonists within a Hindi film narrative, but also are regarded as a scarce commodity by producers, distributors, and financiers, and thereby monopolize the finance capital of the industry.

Producers and directors are not the only ones with the power to greenlight a film in the Hindi film industry. Male stars frequently initiate projects—or are the first ones consulted about a project—as depicted in the chapter four sketch, where Lakhani approaches Khanna with an offer to star in a film, even though its script has yet to be written.
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If aspiring writers, producers, or directors can persuade a male star about their story idea or script, the chances of it turning into a film are very high, since casting a male star is usually the first step in putting together a Hindi film. This characteristic is illustrated by the interaction between Chadda and the aspiring screenwriter Alok Sharma. Chadda asks who Sharma has in mind for the role of the “hero” of the film even before the writer finishes his description of the script. Sharma requests that Chadda speak to Khanna about the film, in the hope that Khanna’s interest and approval of the script might translate into Malhotra’s willingness to produce the film. A star’s readiness to participate signals to producers, financiers, or directors the viability of a project, and once a star is on board, this fact is used in the pre-production stage—or in the early stages of production— to raise finance and sell the distribution rights of the film.

Producer/directors with standing and power in the industry do initiate their own film projects; these projects are usually conceived with a particular male star or set of stars in mind, however. All of the screenwriters I had met and interviewed impressed this fact upon me. Veteran screenwriter Sachin Bhaumick spoke to me at length about how he goes about writing a script, which is tailored to the particular star the producer has finalized for the film: “You need to know that nobody buys a story just by hearing a story here. The producer comes and says, ‘I can get Akshay Kumar and Saif; have you got a two-hero subject?’ Then I narrate a subject, because the picture’s salability depends on the stars, not on the
writer. Nobody hears the story and then selects the artist” (Bhaumick, interview, October 1996). Even if a script is written prior to selecting a star, a project can be shelved due to the star’s lack of interest. Screenwriter Anjum Rajabali described a case that he felt was the correct way of planning a film—he wrote a script for which he was paid; a director had been finalized, but when the script was narrated to the star, he refused the part: “We had to abandon the project. I said, ‘Go get somebody else; it’s a damn good role,‘ but they [the producer and director] said, ’No, we want him, so abandon it.’ So once a star says yes, it works” (Rajabali, interview, September 1996). Bhaumick reiterated the importance of a story appealing to a star: “See what happens, a producer will come to me and say, ‘I can get Shah Rukh Khan, but with great difficulty, so I need a story that Shah Rukh will like.’ I have to keep in mind Shah Rukh Khan and write a story and if he likes it, then they will make the picture” (Bhaumick, interview, October 1996).

In the chapter four sketch, the interaction between Chadda and Sharma also raises a series of issues about the gendered dimension of stardom and power in the industry. Although Sharma describes the film as a woman’s struggle, Chadda searches for a hero in the film—asking Sharma about his preferences for a male star. When Sharma states he had Vijay Khanna in mind, Chadda immediately criticizes the choice, asserting that a star of Khanna’s stature would not want to act in a film where the heroine’s role is more significant than his. Films that have a woman as the protagonist or main narrative agent are referred to as “heroineoriented,” and a central truism within the industry is that such films have a hard time succeeding commercially at multiple levels. Producers are not interested in developing scripts with women at the center, since they would have a hard time bringing on board a top male star, thereby encountering difficulties in selling the distribution rights, which had been the main source of finance for a film until the advent of corporatization. Bhaumick lamented how the exclusive focus on the male star was a creative constraint: “Even if I have two or three ideas for a heroine-oriented subject, nobody wants to listen to them. I’ll tell a producer, ‘Look, I have a really good idea for a heroine-oriented film, Madhuri Dixit will be perfect in it,’ but they’re not interested. They always say, ‘It won’t sell, because the moment you take a heroine-oriented subject, I cannot go to Shah Rukh, Ajay Devgan, Sunny Deol [top male stars]; all of them will refuse. If you take a new guy, it will not sell’ ” (Bhaumick, interview, October 1996).

The reason that heroines “don’t sell” is due to the second prevailing belief that female stars do not generate the huge first weekend box-office
collections, referred to as an “initial” or an “opening” in industry parlance, that has become a crucial barometer of a film’s commercial success. Female stars are simply not perceived as having the same box-office clout as male stars. Screenwriter Sutanu Gupta explained, “The game today is to get the initial, rake in as much as possible. Woman-oriented subjects . . . don’t have an initial. It is the word of mouth which spreads. A herooriented subject gets an initial and that’s why distributors find it safe” (Gupta, interview, 18 November 1996).

Despite this dominant belief, a small number
of
films with women as the central protagonist do get developed and produced, but each of these films tends to be accompanied by a great deal of discourse about the difficulties that the film will face with distributors and audiences. Producers also look for ways to mitigate the risks of these films by trying to recruit a male star to act in the film, even as a special appearance. In 1996, I was able to observe the pre-production process of the film
Dushman
(Enemy, 1998), which was being produced by Pooja Bhatt, an actress who had recently turned producer.
Dushman
was Bhatt’s second film as a producer, and she had gotten one of the top female stars at the time, Kajol, to play the lead in the film, which was about identical twin sisters, with one avenging the rape-murder of the other. Although the film was very mainstream in terms of its narrative, aesthetic, and use of music, Bhatt’s uncle, Mukesh, who was guiding her early efforts in production, kept displaying an ambivalence about the project. On the one hand, he would assert how unique it was that “one heroine has signed another heroine for a film,” encouraging Bhatt to trumpet this fact with distributors and the trade, but on the other he would assert how heroines do not pull in the crowds. Bhaumick, who was one of the writers of the film, told me about Mukesh’s worries about the film: “Even Mukesh Bhatt says, ‘I will not be able to sell without a big hero’ ” (Bhaumick, interview, October 1996). One afternoon Pooja, her father, uncle, and Tanuja Chandra, who was directing the film, had a long discussion about possible male leads opposite Kajol. They kept throwing out names of actors who were characterized as newcomers. By the time the film went into production, the script had been changed and leading male star, Sanjay Dutt, had been recruited to play an important role, though his name was never mentioned during the early phases of the film’s planning. None of the actors from the initial casting discussions were in the film, confirming Bhaumick’s point that, while films with established male stars and debutant actresses do not encounter difficulties in the trade, “new boys don’t sell.”

Sridhar Kumar, the struggling director, released his first film in 2003;
it starred seven actresses of varying stardom, but no male star. A testament to industry tenets, the film did not open well at the box-office. While Kumar acknowledged he was taking a risk with his directorial debut, he maintained that the risk would have been mitigated somewhat if the producer had requested that his friend, a top male star, play a key role in the film. What disturbed Kumar the most was the fact that the star frequently spent time on his set: “He was there every day, just sitting there and drinking tea and hanging out! How hard would it have been for him to do the role? I’m sure if my producer had asked him, he would have done it. I don’t understand!” Kumar’s lament points to two of the most important attributes governing success in the industry—male stars and personalized relationships.

The centrality of stars to the filmmaking process is further underscored by the tremendous amount of discourse—mostly negative and critical—about them within the film industry, and the frequency with which producers and directors tried to represent their creative autonomy by invoking the figure of the star as a foil. Producer/director Rakesh Roshan’s exposition of his superior filmmaking practice, during our interview, focused a great deal on how he was able to handle infamously temperamental stars. He emphasized that a good director needed to exhibit clarity of vision and command over the filmmaking process in order to keep actors in line. He pointed out how an actor, with his fame, persona, and entourage, could overwhelm and intimidate directors: “Sometimes what happens is, if you are not clear, an actor can come and confuse you. See, because an actor is a very dominating personality—he comes in a big car; there are twenty people following him; he’s got his spot boys—so the director’s in awe of that actor, and if the actor suggests something, the director thinks, ‘If I say no to him, he’ll feel bad,’ so he says, ‘
Haan yeh
accha idea, aisa kar lete
’ [Yes, this is a good idea, let’s do it like that], but he’s not going with the screenplay; he’s going with the actor. He’s being dominated by his personality” (Roshan, interview, May 1996).

Roshan mentioned that he was very aware of the jockeying for power on a film set undertaken by actors, because he was once an actor and remembered criticizing his directors: “An actor on the very first day comes to know, like a [race] horse comes to know, whether he [has] a good rider or not: an actor comes to know [that] in the very first shot, ‘
Yeh kuch
chalne waale nahin hai
’ [This guy isn’t going to budge], so we have to do as he says; we have to be very punctual with this man, because he honors his commitment” (Roshan, interview, May 1996). Roshan further stated that a director’s behavior and professional demeanor set the tone
for actors’ own behavior: “If am perfect, if I am honoring all my commitments, I don’t see why an actor will not be punctual with me, [or] will misbehave with me” (Roshan, interview, May 1996). “Ninety-nine percent” of the time, according to Roshan however, actors were not handled properly by directors, which were why they became “dominant” and gave producers and directors trouble—defined mainly by perennial tardiness. He rounded out his discussion with a couple of anecdotes demonstrating his skill at managing stars who were noted for being difficult, thus revealing his exceptionalism as a filmmaker.
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If Roshan cited his firmness and authority over stars to express his greater creative autonomy in comparison with his colleagues, producer/ director Subhash Ghai asserted his ability to make commercially successful films without established stars as evidence of his distinction and mastery within the industry. He represented himself as a revolutionary risktaker, with casting decisions that bypassed prevailing stars. Referring to his film
Vidhaata
(1982), Ghai said, “I was fed up with stars, so I took the absolutely old man, Mr. Dilip Kumar, and absolutely new boy, Sanjay Dutt, and I deleted all of the middle generation of stars” (Ghai, interview, October 2000). He explained that he became frustrated with stars, specifically their sense of self-importance, and the hold they had over the industry. Describing the genesis of his film
Hero
(1983), Ghai stated that initially he was going to make a film with Kamal Hassan, a popular star from the Tamil film industry. After the commercial success of his debut Hindi film, however, Hassan had become so temperamental and inaccessible that Ghai decided to drop him from his project: “He made lots of
nakras
[frivolous complaints] and made me run for six months. One day I wrote him, ‘Thank you very much; you’re a good actor, but I’m making a different film.’ Within six days I thought of an idea, which was
Hero
. I picked up a boy from some corner in Bombay, and next day I cast him as the hero of my film.”
Hero
was a big commercial hit and the actor introduced by Ghai, Jackie Shroff, became a major star of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Ghai’s discovery of Shroff—and Shroff’s subsequent success—became a part of Ghai’s self-representation and the film industry’s lore, expressed in the trade and general press, about him as a powerful star-maker.

Ghai further elaborated upon his exceptionalism by mentioning a time when he began shooting a film with one of the top stars of the industry, then decided to abandon the project after ten days because he could not deign to laugh at the star’s bad jokes. Ghai periodically asserted throughout our interview that he never wanted to laugh at a star’s bad jokes, which emblematized the unequal status and hierarchical relation
ship between stars and producers or directors: “That will be my death, that is what I have always thought. Every ugly or boring joke of a star, I would not like to be a filmmaker of that stature.” After he rejected working with the particular star, Ghai said that he received many accolades from his peers, for his action had “created a lot of confidence in the directors’ community.” Although Ghai cited this anecdote as an example of his autonomy and status as a producer/director, the fact that he asked me to not identify the star bespeaks the actual hierarchies existing with the industry. By the time I met Ghai in 1996, he was working with established male stars and has continued to work with them, while his “discovery” and introduction of new actresses has diminished over time.
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