Kohl-rimmed eyes, translucent chiffon saris, long hair worn loose — from Rakhi in Kabhi Kabhie, Rekha in Silsila, Sridevi in Lamhe and Chandni, Madhuri Dixit in Dil To Pagal Hai and Katrina Kaif in Jab Tak Hai Jaan, Yash Chopra has a very definitive idea of what his leading ladies should look like. And yet, the styling was only reflective of what he imagined these women to be: Fragile, ethereal, but with a core of steel. “At the time (that Yashji was at his most prolific), the styling in Bollywood tended towards garishness. In the midst of that, he wanted to depict what was pure. His taste, his sense of colour were phenomenal and were grounded in simplicity,” says designer Manish Malhotra, who worked with him on films like Dil To Pagal Hai, Veer-Zaara and JTHJ.
In a recent interview to Vogue India, the director spoke at length about how he styled the women in his films. He revealed that Rekha “wore her own jewellery during the making of Silsila”, that he “rejected 54 dresses designed by Manish (Malhotra) before finally approving the simple one that Madhuri wore in Dil To Pagal Hai” and that Sridevi had to be reassured that although she would be primarily shot in white costumes in Chandni, she “wouldn’t look like a widow”.
Manish attests to the excessive interest the director took in the “look” for his heroines: “He made it a point to be present at fittings, and he’d have a very clear brief on the kinds of colours he wanted used.” But if Chopra presented the most romantic side of his heroines (something veteran actress Farida Jalal attributes to his “placing women on a pedestal”), with his leading men, he attempted the un-attempted. He portrayed Amitabh Bachchan to the audiences as the “angry young man” in Deewaar and SRK as the obsessed lover in Darr. Film writer Bhawana Somaaya says while Chopra didn’t introduce the anti-hero, he had the vision to bring out a side of these actors that other directors hadn’t.
“He was a visionary, he had foresight and he took a gamble that paid off. Deewaar and Darr made megastars out of Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan,” says Bhawana.
Rakesh Shrestha, who was the stills photographer for Lamhe and Chandni, agrees that it was Mr Chopra’s ability to take a risk that helped him portray his leading men and women in such a memorable (albeit contradictory) fashion. “He was a gutsy director, always willing to experiment,” recounts Rakesh. “Sometimes his experiments worked, sometimes they didn’t.”
Manish says the director wanted to film a last song sequence in the Swiss Alps with Katrina Kaif and Shah Rukh Khan for JTHJ, something that was put on the backburner once he fell ill. For audiences that would have been a fitting image indeed to remember the director by: Two beautiful people and the promise of eternal love, against the backdrop of the pristine mountains.
(with inputs from Kusumita Das)