Interviews with film personalities can be as exciting as Grand Prix racing. Or they can be as crashingly boring as a politician’s election sermon. Either way, all my life ever since I was in my knee pants, I’ve been trying to get it right. Steer clear of responses which are fake as a 12-rupee currency note, edit out those self-promotional declarations. And if private life peccadilloes must be unearthed or confirmed, just ask straight off, “Are you having an affair with X, Y or Z, Z-2 or Z-3”?
Odds are that the answers will be the chestnutty, “No comments” or “We are just friends.” Once in an indigo moon, the answer will be, “Yes.” Pregnant pause, and then the spoiler, “That’s off the record, am telling you because you’re a friend. I can trust you.”
Trust! Forget it. No Bollywoodwallah will trust a journo even with a jar of cookies. The fear is that the journo will eat up all the choco-flakes and not even say thank you. Saala sugar-haraams. In my case, Mr Amitabh Bachchan once blogged that I’d guzzled his “expensive and exclusive wine”, and had spread myself at his dining table. Wow. Now, do I resort to bad manners by retaliating about the inequities suffered while writing a commissioned birthday book on him? Or?... Never mind.
Guess it’s a question of breeding. Dozens of publishers call to commission a tell-all tome on my days in the Bachchan vineyard. I desist. Nope that just wouldn’t be professional.
For aspiring interviewers, the first and only cardinal rule is to conduct oneself as an equal. Neither flaunt a superior nor an inferior attitude to the subject of your q-and-a, chat-a-thon or conversation. Neither glorify nor demolish. Keep the readers in mind, and obtain answers which they want to know at a certain point of a star’s career.
Like it or not, stars’ private lives are public domain. Still don’t be intrusive, question without scandalous intent. Be ready to be accused by the interviewee that he or she has been misquoted, so tape-record or cross-check the statements made in the heat of the moment.
Aah, am sounding a bit professorial about this. Perhaps that because I’ve learnt my lessons down three decades, the hard way. It makes sense to pass on the alphabet of interviewing imbibed, often at the expense of being flummoxed. The most recent was one of frank and fearless comments on the ungrateful nature of several high-profile Bollywood personalities. At the end of the interface, I was asked, “Do you have the guts to write all this?” I tempered down the remarks, the interview appeared in cold print. To put it politely, then, the excreta hit the fan. If the battering-ram statements couldn’t be denied it’s because they were recorded on my cell-phone. Phew.
Despite the in-built hazards, interviews can be an exercise that’s incisive, analytical and even entertaining. An actor or a director, of course, expects you to clean up his contradictions, grammar and language, as if you were his employed housemaid.
In case you don’t, there’s trouble. Example: an interview with director Subhash Ghai was printed in his exact verbiage. Next morning, he wanted to complain to the directors’ association that he had been mocked. Huh, how can you possibly make an interviewee sound like yourself, or Wren and Martin? Months later, Mr Ghai’s anger subsided.
Or take the case of Akshay Kumar. If his performances came under the scanner, he complained to the management. Solution: don’t write about him at all. Akshayji didn’t like that either. Bad press is preferable to indifference. So off I went to Film City to record his words of wisdom. Peace prevailed.
Sparring between the question-bowler and the answer-batter are endemic. If they weren’t, interviews would be nothing but publicity hand-outs rephrased. A lot of that’s happening nowadays but to each era its own. No point sighing, “But in the good ole days, it used to be..” They still can be…
Many film stars are majorly articulate, cautious but can be discursive, they can let you delve into their psyche so to speak. Regardless of his blog-diatribes, I can honestly say that in my experience Amitabh Bachchan has been the most exciting actor to interview.
I’d find him self-effacing and no expert in avoiding controversies. Before answering, he’d think and could be marvellously candid. I use the past tense. Got to hand the crown to him, he’s Interview Material No. 1.
Shabana Azmi dots her p’s and q’s, she’s always rewarding to quiz. Rekha breathes cultivated enigma. Rishi Kapoor’s a treat. Anil Kapoor enjoys being grilled. Karan Johar’s consistently sensible and sophisticated. Ranbir Kapoor admits, “I cannot lie...” and answers dot-on. Hrithik Roshan’s conversations disclose innate intelligence. A.R. Rahman’s unwaveringly honest.
Rani Mukherjee can let her guard down and talk honestly, on occasion. Shah Rukh Khan’s smarter than a whip, making good-natured digs at his peers. That gets him into trouble but then that’s him. Aamir Khan was brainy when he didn’t design every interview for his imminent film’s release. Salman Khan’s erratic, Saif Ali Khan’s urbane (but duplicitous), and Ajay Devgn scary because you don’t know whether he’s with you, or cursing under his breath.
The nightmares are the monosyllabic Akshaye Khanna (remember him?), Kareena Kapoor (speaking a lot without saying anything), Mallika Sherawat who mistakes herself to be Natalie Portman. Riteish Deshmukh’s tongue-tied. Kajol’s needlessy ‘superior’. Priyanka Chopra and Kangna Ranaut are cases of you-don’-even-want-to-go-there.
So, the next time you read a film star interview, do spare a thought for the interviewer. It involves blood, sweat and above all, a tape-recorder to prevent allegations of misquotation.