Rajesh Khanna was said to have driven into the studio in his MG sports car on day one of his career, but KL Saigal’s lifestyle didn’t brook such luxury
Photo courtesy: Kamat Foto Flash
A BA in English Literature, Dharam Dev Pishorimal Anand’s first job was at the military censor’s office at Churchgate in Bombay. He was never a great actor but his style fascinated the audience
New Theatres’ Puran Bhagat directed by Debaki Bose broke records as audiences across the nation kept coming back to theatres again and again to sing with Saigal. With a string of hits, Saigal went on to become India’s first superstar though nobody had heard of the term at the time. Rajesh Khanna was said to have driven into the studio in his MG Sports car on day one, but KL Saigal’s lifestyle didn’t brook such luxury. Considered ‘one of the highest paid stars of the time’, he drew a salary of `200 a month plus a daily allowance of `1. As his popularity kept zooming, he found it difficult to move around in public transport. When friends suggested he buy a car for himself, he found the idea ‘too expensive’. After a lot of thought, he chose to buy a mobike. One day he lost control and the bike toppled causing a traffic jam. That day on, people often watched the amusing spectacle of India’s biggest star being ‘chauffeured’ around on a mobike until he was forced to buy a car of his own. The next big star, Ashok Kumar had stardom thrust on him under bizarre circumstances. After his B.Sc., Ashok Kumar Ganguly had been dragged to Bombay Talkies by his brother-in-law (wife’s brother) S Mukherji, who was a part of Bombay Talkies, to work free in the studio lab to gain some experience. Ashok was spotted (carrying a bucket of water) by Himanshu Rai, the owner of Bombay Talkies, as a potential hero. Rai was desperately on the lookout for a young hero to complete Jeevan Naiyya which had been left incomplete after a major controversy. A shy Ashok Kumar was not keen on a career in acting. The most forbidding thought for him was romancing a woman in front of a camera and then being seen by the whole world. But Rai forced a screen test on him. Ashok saw an escape route when Bombay Talkies’ highly respected director, a German by the name of Franz Osten, rejected him because of his “awkward jaw-line”. Rai, however, overruled Osten and cast the young man opposite his wife Devika Rani in Jeevan Naiyya. The film was a hit, so was the next one, Achhut Kanya. And soon the Devika Rani-Ashok Kumar team became a rage. Jeevan Naiyya had remained incomplete because the original hero, a handsome young actor by the name of Najmal Hussain, had committed
the worst ‘crime’ any newcomer could have thought of. He had eloped with the heroine Devika Rani (who happened to be Himanshu Rai’s business partner besides being his wife), causing a major uproar. The two had fallen madly in love during the filming of the first few reels of the film. They were caught and Devika was forgiven and brought back to continue with Jeevan Naiyya opposite the new hero Ashok Kumar. Little was heard of Hussain after that.
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tars of the golden era might have been more discreet but they were adventurous when it came to affairs of the heart. A mention of Dilip Kumar brings back images of a beautiful Madhubala sending a red rose to him through her hairdresser with a fragrant hand-written note in Urdu asking him not to accept the rose if he didn’t love her. The two were to meet on the set of their first film together, Tarana. Though a bit taken aback, Dilip Kumar accepted the rose gracefully. Dilip was smarting under the painful breakup with ‘the only woman he had really loved’, Uma Kashyap, a beauty pageant winner from Mussoorie. She had been discovered by Chetan Anand and launched in his film Neecha Nagar, the first ever Indian film to win an international award at Cannes. Dilip had first met her on the sets of Nadiya Ke Paar and the two had hit it off like a house on fire. They acted together in three more films and all four were hits. Unlike most youngsters of his generation, Dilip Kumar had no interest in acting. He had barely seen a dozen films till he was into his twenties. One day he was in Nainital to buy fruits for his father’s business when he ran into Devika Rani. Dilip didn’t know who she was, but she saw a potential actor in the bright-eyed young man. She asked him if he would like to act in films. He said yes, looking at it as a job opportunity and agreed to meet her in Bombay. When she offered him a role in Jwar Bhata, he had merely looked at it as a job. The money would be handy since the family was going through a financial crisis at the time. But there was a major hurdle. How would he break the news to the family? His father was averse to children from respectable families acting in films. He would constantly ridicule his friend from Peshawar, Basheshwarnath Kapoor, whose son Prithviraj Kapoor had taken to acting. He called him a kanjar’s father (kanjar meant a pimp). Dilip’s only resort was to consult his elder brother Ayub Khan, whom he idolised. Ayub told the family that Yusuf (Dilip) had taken up a good job in the Glaxo company! summEr 2013 | Brunch collector’s edition |
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