Signing you in

It is largely believed that, unlike many films in the world, a Hindi film’s fate is largely dependent on its star actor. Of course, there have been films where a non-star actor has led the film to success, but these are usually seen as an anomaly. A film’s budget, positioning and even its promotions is usually single-handedly dependent on the stars on the poster, and this gives the stars an undue amount of power even during the making of a film. Filmmaker David Dhawan, in a recent chat with son, actor Varun Dhawan, elaborated on the same and said that “everything is run by the actors.”

It appeared as though Varun was on the receiving end of these remarks as he is celebrated as one of the most popular stars of Bollywood. “It’s run by the actors. It was the same before and it’s the same now,” David said, in a chat shared on Radio Nasha. When Varun questioned that even films like 12th Fail, which starred Vikrant Massey, who was not seen as a star before the film, are finding success, David immediately responded saying that director Vidhu Vinod Chopra made many flops before 12th Fail. “None of his films had been working. He was always a good maker, technically.”

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Varun brought up Aditya Dhar’s Dhurandhar and credited its success to the director, and not the actor Ranveer Singh, David joined in and said, “Dhurandhar is the director’s win.” He quickly added, “But usually actors have a bigger role.” He then said that actors often change their tune when a director faces a failure, and start looking the other way. “What happens with actors is, when they are working with a director and his film doesn’t work, the actors change their tune and go another way. Actor ki jaat hai yeh. Actor kisi ka nahi hai (Actors are this. They are not loyal to anyone),” he said. An embarrassed Varun looked on and admitted, “Actors are very insecure. I can’t deny that.”

In the same chat, David said that when he got the first opportunity to work with Rishi Kapoor in Bol Radha Bol (1992), Rishi refused to work with him as he said, “Yeh kisko le aaya? Main nahi karunga (Who have you brought? I won’t do it.)” However, things changed quickly after that. At that time, David was directing Shola Aur Shabnam (1992), starring Govinda and Divya Bharti and producer Nitin Manmohan had seen some of the rushes of the film. He quickly promised David that he would be directing his next film, for which, Rishi had already been signed.

When Rishi refused to do the film, Nitin said, “You might not do it but he (David) will do it.” Rishi eventually came on board and Rishi and David quickly became friends. “I became a favourite of Chintu ji’s after that. But he is like that. He is a guy who rags. He used to rag his son also,” he said.

Despite working with all the biggest stars of the 1990s and early 2000s David faced a time when stars were hesitant to work with him, which is when he decided to make Chashme Baddoor (2013). Starring Taapsee Pannu, Ali Zafar, Divyenndu and Siddharth, David said that he made this film “out of anger”. Rishi Kapoor had a small role in the film and he was upset that he did not have much to do in the film. “I said, ‘Karo yaar (Do it please).’ He did it for me,” David recalled and added, “I wanted to get out of that rut of stars which is very difficult. When someone can write a good film, why not pick up newcomers and work with them? Stars interfere a lot.”

David is looking forward to the release of his next, Hai Jawani Toh Ishq Hona Hai, which stars his son Varun, along with Mrunal Thakur and Pooja Hegde. The film’s release is currently in jeopardy as Vashu Bhagnani has sued David Dhawan and producer Ramesh Taurani for Rs 400 crore for unathorised use of Biwi No 1 songs. Biwi No 1 was produced by Vashu and directed by David.

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