'Goldie and Dev sahab’s cinema has this spirit of survival'

In Hum Dono The Dev and Goldie Story Bloomsbury India Tanuja Chaturvedi who has worked in radio theatre film and television in varying capacities as an actor producer director editor and teacher writes how in 1988 after graduating from FTII she dialled on a sudden whim a number off the film directory ldquoI asked for Dev sahab and heard the famous drawl lsquoDev herersquordquo she writes And just like that she was invited to meet Hindi cinemarsquos famous evergreen hero at his Anand Recording Studio in Pali Hill Thus began the authorrsquos abiding affiliation with the Anand brothers which finds its culmination in the book From Vijay Anandrsquos experimentation with film time in Kala Bazar to why Ashok Kumar went MIA during the shoot of Jewel Thief Hum Dono bustles with anecdotes and analysis as an insider delves deep into some of the duorsquos most memorable collaborations Edited excerpts from the interviewTell us about the experience of putting this book together I understand that you drew from the material that you acquired during your research for a film on Navketan around 1990 which ultimately fell throughThis being Dev sahabrsquos centenary year is an unexpected miracle for me I never planned a book to meet this momentous occasion Goldie and Dev sahabrsquos cinema has this spirit of survival That longevity is what I wanted to celebrate The early research was very exciting for me because I had access to the Anands and met people I never even dreamt of meeting like Pancham da The interactions were very intense Then I segued into working with Dev sahab and that relationship continued But the stirrings of the book were always inside me It was a generational transference of fandom starting with my mother who was his diehard fan and my brothers who took me for his blackandwhite reruns Dev Anandrsquos neversaydie spirit his optimism and his charm used to just leap out at us His spirit attracted us kids who werenrsquot even born when he started making films Plus he was very westernised he was hip and cool He was like us I met him as a fiveyearold He had picked me up at the premiere of Pyaar Mohabbat in Delhi and I never let him forget that He was almost like a father figure to me I argued with him a lot and I used to get away with a lot as wellWith Goldie sahab the interest began during our student days at FTII as we began studying his almost invisible craft There was nothing that he did not excel inmdashscreenplay dialogues editing direction And he was a selftaught maverick He owes nothing to cinema that came before him He is so original He is a genius and we have not celebrated our geniuses enough When I was invited to teach film appreciation at Whistling Woods International the standard practice is to start with Pather Panchali but I decided to begin with Johny Mera Naam I saw the craft work the storyrsquos magic work the breathless narration work So this admiration that I had got confirmed It was all inside me and it actually took me just a month to write the first draft of the book It just came pouring outmdashthere wasnrsquot any sort of consciousnessGoldie Anand shooting the song lsquoDil Pukarersquo with Dev Anand and Vyjayanthimala in Gangtok Pics CourtesyBloomsbury IndiaYou write about the GoldieDev partnership as belonging in the tradition of great directoractor collaborations like Kurosawa and Mifune or Wong Kar Wai and Tony Leung In case of Goldie and Dev what do you think each brought to the equationThey were extremely individualistic people Goldie Sahab was very goaloriented which you have to be if you are a director of a film Dev Sahab was processoriented which is why his career is very different It just lasts It just goes on He just loved the fact that he was making films He was like as Mani Kaul said ldquoswaant sukh ke liye banata hoon the joy of creation which is its own endrdquo But they were completely intertwined in the creative process from the get go They understood each other shared the same ethics the same gene pool They had common values were both educated wellread people They were intellectuals passionately fond of knowing what was happening in the world There were some buttons as an actor that got pushed and there was a coming together of energy an osmosis a collision a cohesiveness when they worked together If Dev Anand became Goldie Anandrsquos alter ego on screen then Dev Anandrsquos own philosophy of life imbued Goldie Anandrsquos cinemaBut they also had creative differences During the shoot of Nau Do Gyarah for instance Goldie insisted on stretching the climax which brought him into conflict with the team He turned five minutes of real time and stretched it into ten minutes of film time In the climax the villain gives the hero five minutes to get the police cleared out of the area At stake is the heroinersquos life she is held hostage and drugged Goldie wished to expand this time to make each characterrsquos tension mount He edited the film for 13 continuous days sleeping overnight at the editing room He got into battles with the editor Dharam Vir who was unsure if the stretchedout climax would work Dev was appealed to reason with Goldie He tried but Goldie was very sure and wouldnrsquot budge Finally at the mixing stage the sound recordist also expressed uncertainty over whether the long climax would hold the audiencersquos attention Finally Goldie asked them to run his version once If the audience booed then from the next show on the shorter edited version could be played But he was so frustrated that he did not even attend the filmrsquos premiegravere reaching at the end of the filmrsquos first showing He saw that the climax had audiences spellbound breathless and rooting for the lead actors Goldiersquos gamble workedAt the same time Goldie knew how to control Dev sahab A director needs to push Dev sahab in directions he felt uncomfortable with You need a person who will be able to say no You need a person who will be able to orchestrate performances He was also intuitive about when to liberate the actor If you see the song lsquoKhoya khoya chandrsquo itrsquos about the exuberance of falling in love so he just lets Dev sahab loose But when you see lsquoTere Mere Sapnersquo from Guide which is only three shots it is shot in the magic hour with the light fading and yoursquove got a five to 10minute window to shoot the whole song which involves complex camera work framing focus points lip sync and expressions And thatrsquos also the key song for the film Their synergy and deep understanding of each other is evident in lsquoPal bhar ke liyersquo where the camera and Dev dance in tandemGoldie AnandWhich is your favourite film by the duo and whyMy favourite will always be Guide because it is a very difficult film to make Itrsquos about so many thingsmdashitrsquos a love story about a woman finding her strength through her passion about a guide who loses his own path and falls abysmally Therersquos something fascinating that happens in every viewing Irsquove had with Guide like with students at the Xavier Institute of Communications Mumbai The film starts Raju Dev gets out of jail And then the flashback from Rosiersquos Waheeda point of view starts which is the whole body of the film more than two hours encompassing the love which blossoms the love which decays the death of love itself By the time you have been taken through this entire emotional journey you are so engrossed that you have forgotten how the film begun The film is actually working on two completely different planes And that is the brilliant part Rajursquos awakening his enlightenment is why the film resonates with us To seek for the meaning of life is ingrained in the DNA of the people of this country and that is reflected in the filmTanuja ChaturvediIf there was one thing you could say you learnt from each of the Anands what would they beFrom Chetan Anand I would say his imagination rigour and his imagemakingmdashthe way he uses colour palettes in films So if you see Kudrat itrsquos how he makes the two characters dress in complementary colours as theyrsquore coming closer or what he and Jal Mistry did to the colour palette of Heer Raanjha He had an experimental vivid kind of an imagination From Dev Sahab I think I learnt passion I learnt complete dedication and immersion It was literally the Gita saying about how you have the right to work but for the workrsquos sake only and the desire for the fruits of work must never be your motive in working That was possibly the spirit behind even writing the book because when I wrote I didnrsquot even know a publisher It was just that it was a work which was fulfilling me It was a work which I was giving everything to believing that this love will reach the readers because it was coming from a place of love From Goldie Sahab I think I have learnt everything about cinema He made films within the matrix of Hindi mainstream yet each of his films is intensely personalmdashthey are experimentations with cinema time explorations of themes of redemption manwoman relationships in all their hues and even appeals to our neighbouring countries to live in harmony with us Thatrsquos the big learningmdashthat you can communicate something personal in the freeflowing format of mainstream filmAlso Read Zubin Mehta in Mumbai My life conducting orchestra is like a molten lava it never stopsEXTRACT How Vijay convinced Dev to make Nau Do GyrahChetan was the patriarch of the Anand familyrsquos creative experiment Navketan All creative calls were run by him On the sets of Funtoosh when he fell ill during the shoot he gave Goldie the responsibility of a song picturisation Dev was uncertain Goldie was very young Yet keeping his doubts aside Dev gave Goldie a chance Goldie picturised his first song for Hindi cinema with pizzazz surprising now a rather pleased Dev The song was lsquoAe Meri Topi Palat Ke Aarsquo Interestingly though the credit titles read S D Burman this tune was composed by yet another young prodigy R D BurmanOnce again Dev discovered that Goldiersquos script was yet to see the light of day This time he heard good things about the script from his House No 44 director Mandi Burman Dev asked Goldie for the script Goldie was insistent only he would give a narrationSo on a drive to Mahabaleshwar ensconced between Dev and his sisterinlaw Kalpana Kartik cameraman V Ratra seated next to the driver Goldie narrated the detailed script of Nau Do Gyarah By the time they reached Mahabaleshwar Goldie was reading the last page of his twister climaxAfter finishing he waited Silence No reaction The car entered Fredrick Hotel Devrsquos favourite haunt in Mahabaleshwar The lamps aligned on the pathway here are shaped like the logo which appears before the early Navketan films Life imitating artDev got out of the car and instantly booked a trunk call to his Bombay office He asked his production manager to delay the film they were to start and announced that he had selected the next film by Navketan Nau Do Gyarah to be directed by Vijay Anand A floor at Kardar Studios was booked for ten days Goldiersquos first venture was on the rollExcerpted with permission from Tanuja Chaturvedirsquos Hum Dono The Dev and Goldie Story published by Bloomsbury India