Spoke to Dr Dang about Disco Killer

In one of their escapades the adorable photojournalist buddies Sudhir Ravi Baswani and Vinod Naseeruddin Shah land up in the house of a nearlyblind contract killer Disco Killer DKBy now you know Irsquom talking about Kundan Shahrsquos classic black comedy Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro JBDYmdashthatrsquos approaching 40 years of entertaining us since 1983 Only this isnrsquot some fanfictionWhen Sudhir Vinod enter DKrsquos den theyrsquore awestruck by the precision of his aim Across the walls in the halfblind hitmanrsquos home are targets with bulletholes right in the bullrsquos eye DK explains to the two boys how he does this First he shoots at the wall Wherever the bullet lands he makes a small circle around itHysterical right Well if things had worked out this is how audiences wouldrsquove first seen actor Anupam Kher on screen JBDY was going to be Kherrsquos debutHersquod shot for the movie wearing jacket checked shirt thick darkglasses Walkmanmdashalways looking furthest away from anybody he talked to because he canrsquot tell DK also drank blood and generally danced around without a reasonAlso Read Fast x Hindi dub Movie Review Toretto ko tadapna hogaKher tells me he had barely twothree scenes in JBDY But they were such stealersmdashpeople over generations wouldrsquove laughed even more with DK As they do quoting gags and lines in peculiar accents from the insane satire stillConsider the second scene where Ashok Satish Kaushikmdash thatrsquos Tarnejarsquos Pankaj Kapoor lackeymdashhires DK to bump off Sudhir Vinod DKrsquos been sneezing a lot Right before he has to fire he asks Ashok for the lsquogolirsquo who gives him lsquoVicks ki golirsquo that he shoves into his gun When he finally shoots the real bullet hits the mango on the tree under which his targets are sittingThis makes DK ecstatic For he can now aim at the mangoesmdashthe bullet would land on Sudhir Vinod At the edit JBDY was slipping out of lengthKher reminisces director Kundan Shah was such a ldquonondramatic personrdquo that once they bumped into each other outside Prithvi theatre Shah casually muttered to Kher ldquoYaar woh tere do scenes cut gayerdquomdashthat hersquod been thrown out of the film The DK track had got removedKher was obviously devastated Besides that he was pennilesshomeless JBDY also had all his ldquoNational School of Drama friends who were similarly struggling actorsrdquo Which is trueNaseer was perhaps the only established staractor in JBDY albeit of Hindi cinemarsquos lsquoparallel cinemarsquo movement that had ironically sworn to break the starsystem itselfldquoBut I guess some things donrsquot happen so they can become lifersquos stories to tellrdquo Kher tells me Take another one then Who was the original choice for Mogambo in Mr India ldquoDirector Shekhar Kapoor had originally imagined Mogambo as Iago from The Merchant of Venicerdquomdasha slimy shifty villain who also moves like an octopusKapoor and writer Javed Akhtar had picked Kher for Mogambo who shot a looktest for it wearing a cape on Juhu beach Producer Boney Kapoor had blocked about 100 shootdays with him falling short of a coupleWhether or not dates were the issue Kher learnt from Akhtar that theyrsquod changed the character entirely And gone in for the great Amrish Puri instead Puri had already killed it as Mola Ram the villain for Steven Spielberg in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom 1984Does life equally come full circle Hear this When Kher boomed opposite Dilip Kumar over ldquothappad ke goonjrdquo as Dr Dang in Subhash Ghairsquos Karma 1986mdashPuri indeed walked up to Ghai wondering why didnrsquot he consider him Kher recalls in thick Punjabi Ghai wriggled out replying ldquoBut Dr Dang was playing Amrish Purirdquo CleverKher believes Dr Dang made him a star Being a fan of Karma Irsquod agree Kher had pulled off the quiet wily antagonist in Rahul Rawailrsquos awesome Arjun 1985 too But that bit gets revealed only towards the end Around that time he also played Sridevirsquos terrifying tormentor in Chaalbaaz 1989 ldquomodelling the role on cartoon charactersrdquo That buck teeth was surely Bugs BunnyBut whatrsquos up Doc Dangmdashin Kherrsquos imagination ldquoPhD in international terrorismrdquo We donrsquot think of it perhaps because he hasnrsquot quite been typecast Kher could well be Bollywoodrsquos Villain No 1 The waymore experienced Shakti Kapoor was sidey Villain No 2 in Karma who had a legit issue getting slapped around by Dr Dang Kher 68 saysHersquos done 500 filmsmdash50 of which he signed up within a week of his debut Mahesh Bhattrsquos Saraansh 1984 Even there the fabulous Sanjeev Kumar was brought in last minute to replace himKher had ldquosingularly worked on the part for six monthsrdquo Having packed his bags to leave Mumbai lost all hope he blastedcursed the hell out of Bhatt first Who in turn generously stood up for him before Rajshri the producersYears later once Kher had seen sufficient success Kundan Shah the ldquogentle soulrdquo that he was did regret knocking out DK ldquoYou should have been in the film yaarrdquo he told Kher who regrets further that let alone any footage of JBDY with DK in it not even a still of him in the role remains Well what to say nowmdashab jaane bhi do yaaronMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture He tweets mayankw14Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper