By Surendra Bhatia
This is not a whodunit mystery. There is no single answer to the question of why stars sign the films they do because situations, circumstances and times throw up different answers and different reasons, none difficult to understand. Some of these reasons are actually easy to place in perspective, though specific cases are hard to identify as stars don’t really advertise their immediate motives before signing films.
But, if a star is negotiating to buy a bungalow and needs to have liquid funds to clinch the deal, he will sign not the film that he thinks is the best for him at that point of time but one that offers him the most money. There is this ancient story that a South Indian producer, desirous of making a film with the then reigning phenomenon, Rajesh Khanna, walked into the meeting with suitcases of cash, paid Khanna an unheard of price (believe it or not, reportedly a handsome sum of Rs. 7 lakh!), and walked away with consolidated confirmed dates. In those days, top stars doled out shifts, not days. But this South Indian producer got the days he demanded and finished his film (Haathi Mere Saathi, it is believed) in record time. Rajesh Khanna used the Rs. 7 lakh to buy a bungalow at Juhu in Bombay, which he then gave away as settlement to his ex. Stories, stories, stories. But the example of a star signing a film because the price he’s getting is tempting, is one reason why stars scribble their autograph on the dotted line, as much true now as then.
A star may sign a film because he wants to dabble in a particular genre or if he is looking for a temporary change of image or he wants to make a point. It is said that Aamir Khan was getting a bit bothered that he was doing meaningful cinema like Rang De Basanti and Taare Zameen Par while his contemporaries, Salman and Shah Rukh, were packing their schedules with more commercial cinema. Even though he had a few more ‘sensible’ scripts ready to shoot and waiting only for his nod, Aamir decided to board a full-on commercial action thriller. Ghajini took his fans by surprise. They had gotten used to Aamir and his story-centric films and he threw at them a film so commercial, it had to be from a South Indian film industry. Aamir was, reportedly, motivated to show that he was as good, if not better, at the action genre than the other Khans. Having spectacularly proved his point, he went back to his sensible 3 Idiots and Dhobi Ghat. Of course, Aamir’s fees must have been record-breaking but the motivation for him was not the money as much as the point he wished to make.
Stars usually have families to look after, and none more than Salman Khan. He’s a star of a scale that can help ‘settle’ his family members, if they need his help. Since quite a few years, he has been doing films with his brothers and sisters and their in-laws as co-producers in his films. Generally, Salman’s films are nowadays family productions. The most spectacularly successful example is that of Dabangg. His brother, Arbaaz, good-looking and a skilled actor, was going nowhere in his career. He had reached a point where, of his own admission, producers quibbled about paying him a few lakhs for the roles they offered him. He turned to his brother.
It could be said that Salman launched Arbaaz as producer with Dabangg, setting him off on his new career as producer. But that is nothing new for Salman. He’s done it for his youngest brother, Sohail, too, and also his sister, Alvira, and her husband, Atul Agnihotri. Currently, Salman seems to be making films only with his family members as producers, besides helping out his younger brother-in-law who wants to become a star.
So, the next time you read about Salman Khan and his new production, look closely at the credit list of producers — that family connection is why Salman is doing the film.
(TO BE CONTINUED)
