Dimple Kapadia made a striking entry into Bollywood with her 1973 debut in Bobby. Her stunning and innocent looks captivated the audience, and her styling, especially her polka-dotted blouse sparked a fashion craze among fans. Kapadia reveals how the film’s director, legendary Raj Kapoor meticulously crafted her look with all her outfits being imported from abroad.
“I don’t know of any director at that time who would take so much care about the appearance of his film’s leading lady... what will be her hair like, what will be her clothes like... There is just one word that can explain Raj Kapoor and that is maverick. Everything concerning my look was designed by him... it was incredible... being a man he had done it. He had great foresight and all this showed his passion towards cinema. Bobby is an iconic film; it is a young love story and way ahead of its time. I couldn’t have asked for anything else for my launch in the industry,” says Kapadia in an exclusive chat with ETV Bharat on the occasion of Raj Kapoor's centenary.
“Not just Bobby, all his films have been fantastic. Raj Saab had this great ability to understand relationships, actually interrelationships and he would bring that across beautifully. His sense of drama was to another level and his eye for detailing was completely different,” Kapadia further added.
Kapadia was merely a teenager when she was working with the legend but she was never made to feel that she may not understand cinema and what goes into the making of one at that tender age. “I was new, all of 13 and yet he would sit me down and play songs on a harmonium to make me understand the nuances, its significance and emotion that the song carried in a particular situation. He didn’t have to do all of that but he believed in investing a lot of time on his actors. His love and passion for his actors was tremendous, he would put you on such a high pedestal that you have to stay there, you couldn’t fall off. He would encourage you so much,” says Kapadia, who found it easy working with the director, “because he would enact everything and if you could just imbibe and reproduce about 60 percent of what he showed that would be enough. Not just scenes, he would even speak on sets in a certain way that the characters were meant to speak. After Bobby, I worked with many good directors in several films but I never met a director like him,” she says.
Rahul Rawail, who started assisting Raj Kapoor with Mera Naam Joker, confirms that the latter was a passionate musician. “Raj Saab had a strange gift from god, he would see an instrument and start playing it immediately. Electrical keyboards had just come in ...when we were working on the background music of Kal Aaj Aur Kal... he came for recording, he was curious to know about this new instrument and within a minute he was playing it,” says Rawail.
Raj Kapoor’s son Rishi Kapoor, too, made his debut as a leading hero in Bobby and Kapadia says the treatment meted out to them was equal. “It was absolutely the same treatment, in fact, he must have spent more time on me than his son. Rishi was already a brilliant actor so it wasn’t required and he worked a lot on me. At that time, the age that I was in, one couldn’t understand this was work, it was more like a picnic for me,” she says.
There are many stories of Raj Kapoor being a terror on sets and that his actors and crew members feared him, however, Kapadia was fortunate to not have faced his ire. “He wasn’t strict at all. It was a great relationship that we shared. Of course, I was scared as it was a new experience for me but more than scared, I was in awe of him. He was larger than life,” says the senior actress.
Known for his films like Love Story, Betaab, Arjun, Dacait and Anjaam among others, Rawail reveals a very peculiar habit of the legendary filmmaker. “He wouldn’t scream or get angry at his actors if he was not happy with a shot, he would treat his actors very nicely but if he had to say something to his actors, he would scream at his assistant directors. It was meant for the other person to know. But with his son Rishi he would tell straight on his face, whereas, he would treat the other actors very nicely,” Rawail disclosed.
Narrating an incident on the sets of Bobby, Rawail says, “Actor Prem Nath was riding on the success of Johny Mera Naam before he played that iconic character in Bobby. Prem Nath was quite brash and rough. I would sit very close to Raj Saab when he was directing a scene so that I could catch on to whatever instructions were given. Prem Nath would get excited after every shot and he would scream, ‘What a shot! Fantastic!’ Everybody on the set would start clapping and so did Raj Saab. But one day when Raj Saab was not happy with Prem Nath's shot, he suddenly turned to me and asked, ‘What did you say, Rahul?' But I had not said anything. I was perplexed. He whispered something into my ears and then he turned to Prem Nath saying, ‘One more take because Rahul didn’t like it’. I was caught between the two. Prem Nath asked Raj Saab – ‘Why are you listening to your municipality?’ He used to call assistant directors municipality people. Raj Saab made Prem Nath give one more take saying, ‘Since my assistant is not too happy with the shot we might as well do it once more'."
Further, Rawail went on to assist Raj Kapoor on Bobby, Satyam Shivam Sundaram and Dharam Karam. “Even after Betaab had released I would go on the sets of Prem Rog. I would live with the assistants of that film. I absorbed whatever was happening on the set and even now when I watch his films I learn a lot,” says Rawail.
However, No Entry and Bhool Bhulaiyaa (second and third edition) fame director Anees Bazmee who assisted Raj Kapoor in Prem Rog as a teenager, disagrees with Rawail saying Kapoor never cared about what his actors, assistants, or crew members felt if he yelled at them. “Raj Saab knew that even if he scolded his actors, they wouldn't feel bad. He could afford that. He didn’t calculate so much when he was making a film what and how much he had to tell someone. He was very honest towards his work and his actors would be tense thinking they should not irk Raj Kapoor. Whether it was Rishi or his youngest son Chimpu [Rajiv] or Padmini we would all respect him a lot but there was this khauff [fear] in our mind that he should not get angry at us. There would be this mixed feeling while working with him,” says Bazmee.
When asked if he’d been yelled at, Bazmee said, “Yes, many times. Once, I made some blunder, and I was told that I wouldn’t be travelling with him in a plane, but I would be travelling from Mumbai to Mysore in a jonga (a vehicle formerly used by the Indian Army) with the other assistants and all the lighting equipment. He was a terror on sets but at the same time he loved us. We were given royal treatment. He was a foodie and even our meals would come from Hotel Taj and there would be at least 15 dishes. Before he came into my life, I would eat only vada pav and for the first time I saw oysters and lobsters. When we would meet assistants of other directors, we would feel so special. There are hundreds of incidents when he would get angry and start screaming but today, I feel all that was his blessings. We are fortunate we learnt while working with him, the others learnt by watching his movies. His films are like text books. Every film of his gives a new perspective every time you watch it. He knew the pulse of the audience.”
Veteran actress Aruna Irani fondly recalls how she got a call from Raj Kapoor for Bobby in which she played a seductress trying to woo Rishi Kapoor's character, Chintu Baba, in a party scene. “My films like Caravan and Bombay To Goa were just out. He called me to meet him at his RK Studio. After narrating the role he said, ‘Mind you, this is not a vamp’s role’. He was a modern thinker. Nobody could match him when it came to romance. For any artist, it is a privilege working with him. He was such a great director that he would make non-actors act. He would act himself and show us... he would become my character and do the scene. If we could do even 50 percent of what he showed us that would work big time for the scene. Bobby was a turning point in my career because after that I got a lot of appreciation and many offers. I had started shooting two shifts,” says the actress, who recalls an incident when Raj Kapoor declared ‘pack up’ on the day she felt a bit unwell. “Raj Saab always saw to it that his artistes were comfortable. One day I had a headache and he stopped work on that day. This was on the day when we were filming the birthday scene of Rishi’s character when there were so many people, so many junior artistes on the set who had to be paid. He said, ‘I am also an actor, you don’t enjoy working when unwell’. Now which filmmaker would afford to do that,” says Irani.
After working as a child artiste in Satyam Shivam Sundaram, Padmini Kolhapure made a big breakthrough in Raj Kapoor’s blockbuster musical drama Prem Rog (1982) alongside Rishi Kapoor. "He was an institution in himself and since I started with his film as a child artiste, for me his set was like a school. You obviously learn from your teachers; you absorb their teachings, so everything was naturally inculcated in me. There was a gap of about three years between these two films but I would meet him at his Diwali, Holi parties so I was in touch with him constantly," says Kolhapure.
Expressing her profound love and respect for the showman of Bollywood, the actress says she would sit in the cottage of the filmmaker while working in his films. “He had a bad temper and if he lost it, he lost it. But he wanted the best out of his actors. He would often ask me to watch his old films like Boot Polish, Awaara. Mera Naam Joker... and then he would ask me my opinion after watching those films. It used to be a proper session, there would be a discussion around it. I remember there were too many discussions on Prem Rog’s theme of widow remarriage, whether people would accept it or not .. I would miss his process while working with other directors later on but I stayed in touch with him and continued watching his work. I was devastated when he passed away. So many decades have passed and even today many directors, filmmakers ask me what it was like working with Raj Kapoor, what was he like... which shows he was the true showman of the industry," says Kolhapure.
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