Getting to know King Uncle better

Itrsquos when Rakesh was 17 that his musiccomposer father Roshan passed away The son had no choice but to look for a job in the Bombay film industryPretty much the headquarters of which back then used to be a building called Naaz in South Bombay that housed practically all the main producersdistributorsrsquo officesThe building obviously had limited access But if young Rakesh did manage to meet anybody there he would be treated really well He was after all son of the great Roshan Saab Such was the legacy that his old man had rightly left behindSince he had to introduce himself as Roshanrsquos son to gatekeepers posted outside anyway Rakesh thoughtmdashmay as well adopt his fatherrsquos first name as his own surname Thatrsquos how Rakesh Nagrath became Rakesh RoshanOf course Rakesh had a fairly long innings as an actor He has 94 films to his credit on IMDb He tells me ldquoOut of those 94 though I got 70 films mainly because Irsquod constantly call up producers to cast me And then I figured why donrsquot I just turn producer myself instead of calling them uprdquoKaamchor 1982 was his big break as producer Jaag Utha Insaan 1984 is the movie he produced after that didnrsquot do as wellThis is when he received a letter from a fan urging him to stick to the letter K for the title of all his films Whenever thatrsquos the case those movies necessarily perform betterThe fan cited examples from even Rakeshrsquos acting career Consider Khel Khel Mein Khatta Meetha Khandaan Khubsoorathellip That advice stuck with himThis is how all of Rakeshrsquos films as director his debut Khudgarz 1987 onwards have been titled with K Later Karan Johar picked up the same habit As did Ekta Kapoor for her TV showsHaving watched the Netflix documentary series The Roshans I went over to meet Rakesh in his quiet office in Andheri West There are two big chambers insideThe second one with a resting bed and a sprawling workdesk belongs to Rakeshrsquos fatherinlaw late filmmaker J Om Prakash 19262019 All of whose movies incidentally used to be titled with the letter AIf not with K I joke to Rakesh he could have just titled all his movies Badla Itrsquos fascinating how hersquos told so many stories with the same corecentral ideaWhich is that a person is wronged in the filmrsquos first half And they return to seek revenge in the second halfNow those leads could come back reincarnated Karan Arjun as lookalike Kaho Naa Pyar Hai post cosmetic surgery Khoon Bhari MaanghellipThis isnrsquot to suggest hersquos been directing the same film over and over again The story is in the tellingtreatment isnrsquot itRakesh tells me ldquoTake Khudgarz Itrsquos literally Hrishikesh Mukherjeersquos Namak Haraam 1973 Nobody could see that People wanted to sound intelligent so they compared it to Jeffrey Archerrsquos novel Kane and AbelrdquoAs director Rakesh has a cent per cent record of commercial success at the boxoffice Clearly he knows more than a thing or two about tapping into the pulse of Indian mainstream audiencesWhatrsquos equally interesting is the oldworld financing of all his films right up till his last movie as producer Kaabil 2017He raises funds directly from the 14 distributors placed across the country including overseas who in turn ensure a great release since theyrsquore also personally invested in the project Rakesh says ldquoTill date Irsquove not put in even R5000 of my own money to start a filmrdquoAlong the way he dreams up locations and puts in his personal money to offset going overbudget As he did with Kaho Naa Pyaar Hai 2000 travelling the world to find pristine places hersquod apparently seen in his sleep Hence Christchurch Queenstown New Zealand Krabi Islands ThailandhellipRakesh had mortgaged his home and car while filming Kaho Naa Pyaar Hai ldquoThis habit actually started with Kaamchorrdquo he says Hersquod mortgaged his Mercedes Benz for R2 lakh during the making of that movieKaho Naa Pyar Hai of course gave us a new term That is Hrithikmania A phenomenon was born Thatrsquos Rakeshrsquos son Hrithik who wasnrsquot even aware that his father had staked his personal property for the dream debutRakesh wouldrsquove liked to be a star his son became one instead Itrsquos a bit like Salim Khan whose son Salman fulfilled the fatherrsquos dreamI wonder if it often takes two generations to eventually hit bullrsquos eye in Bollywood Rakesh says ldquoThe second generation has certainly seen the struggles closelyrdquo That probably helpsAlthough we might be at a point in the times of YouTube OTT and social media where the idea of stardom itself is under question What with say Shah Rukh Khan suggesting hersquos the last such of the eraRakesh feels ldquoStardom has a lot do with music Right from Shammi Kapoor Raj Kapoor Rajesh Khanna you could simply identify a star with their songs Aaj kal gaane khatam ho gaye hain wersquove lost those songsrdquoAlso for the person who actually propels that stardom Rakesh says ldquoA producer has to be a jack of all trades He must understand lyrics music casting storyscreenplayhellip The young generation at studios these days are inexperienced on such matters They only know marketingrdquoMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture He tweets mayankw14 Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper