Abhishek Bachchan has given a performance in Kuch Naa Kaho that borders on not being a performance. You actually have a tough time distinguishing between Abhishek and Raj because of the way he’s portrayed him and the performance his director has extracted from him. The young, happy-go-lucky and extremely zestful Raj is someone who discovers who he is and what he wants through the course of the film. Looking back on the entire Kuch Naa Kaho experience, Abhishek relives the process of making one of his favourite films.
Tell me about when you first met Rohan Sippy...
A long time ago... in a place far, far away..! I used to meet Rohan as a kid because our fathers used to work together, so on and off in Kashmir, attending each other’s birthday parties and all but then I was in regular contact with him. We were both in the same boarding school in Switzerland and he was slightly senior to me and that was when we were in regular contact. Then he went off to college and then came back to Bombay and we’d keep meeting and promise to get together and play basketball but never did. Then one day when I was back from college and working I got a call and he said ‘I want to come and narrate a script to you,’ and I thought he just wanted my reaction to it. He narrated the script of Kuch Naa Kaho and I was shocked. I thought it was a fantastic film and said yes. That’s how our association started.
How did you feel when he came to you with the script?
What attracted you to the story of Kuch Naa Kaho?
You’ve delivered a very natural performance in this film, and I mean natural in the respect that the audience believes in the character and that this could be someone you know. You’ve breathed life into who Raj is, how did you manage to pull that off?
How close is the character of Raj to who you are in real life – is their an overflow from screen to reality? The same wacky sense of humour perhaps?
In the behind the scenes footage it seems you’ve lived the character. There’s a lot of Raj off camera who is uncontrolled and while shooting and the camera is on, it seems you retreat into a restrained version of Raj who was making wild jokes and dancing a minute ago and then is within a scene the next. How did this ‘reality’ of Raj come to be and what’s the reason behind so much insane footage ‘off camera’ and in outtakes?
There are certain scenes in the film for example when Raj talks about reincarnation or when he bursts into his antics to achieve his goal, that show a mastery of comedy. You literally muster together comedy while holding a deadpan serious look on your face revealing an Abhishek we haven’t seen on screen before, how did you do that? Were those scenes difficult to do?
What is your favourite scene in the film?
What is your favourite song in the film?
When you saw the film, what could you say you honestly and objectively thought of it? How do you feel looking back on the experience that is Kuch Naa Kaho?
It was weird when he first came to me because I knew him on a personal front and not on a professional front, so for this friend to be asking me something professional for work was something to contend with at first, but it was cool.
See I heard the script as a script and had no idea he wanted me to play the role of Raj. I loved the script and thought it was hilarious, it had a wonderful concept and was very beautifully written and was very witty. I liked that the comedy was not slapstick which we in Indian cinema are used to seeing and doing, which is very loud and here in this film it was primarily a very sophisticated type of comedy more to do with dialogue than with action. So I loved that and remember while he was reading it to me I was thinking I wish I could do a film like this because it’s really funny. When he offered it to me the main thing for me was to just work with him because I thought it would be wonderful to work with somebody I knew and could talk to about anything because he understood where I was coming from and he had the same sensibilities as me, so I just wanted to work with him because although the script was brilliant I was just very keen to work with someone like Rohan.
When I first saw the rushes after he had finished editing and one thing I told him was that watching this you could actually make out that the actor and director understand each other. You could see they complemented each other, because I’ve always believed actors don’t have much to do in films because filmmaking is a director’s medium and we’re just an extension of what the director wants and does and are basically puppets. And I think in KNK Rohan and I have been in perfect sync and I’d like to believe I’ve done what he has asked of me and if the audience feels that way too then I’ve done my job, but because we knew each other so well trying to give him what he wanted because he knew so very well what it was he wanted and he knew how to explain it to me, it definitely made my job easier. I mean I can’t judge the performance but it was definitely easy to work with him because he has a clarity and understanding that allows him to let us know precisely what he wants from a performance, which to any actor is a great asset.
Yes, there definitely is a similarity and partly on purpose from Rohan’s behalf and partly because of the way it just happened. To Rohan’s credit, he was so clear about how Raj would behave that he had written it in such a way that it came very naturally to me. In a way I would like to believe Rohan fashioned Raj from what he saw as me in everyday life. I know for sure he would come up to me and say ‘remember that day we were talking like this and you reacted in such a way, and that’s the kind of reaction I want you to give and to play it like that’, so he understands me so well that a lot of Raj’s mannerisms and style is very much me, which to me shows how much he understands me as a person.
I think the comfort levels were fantastic on this film, we were all so comfortable with each other that this must be the reason. This was my second film with Ash, the cinematographer Mani, I had worked with before because he was the second unit cameraman for Major Saab, and with Rohan being a friend there really wasn’t a work atmosphere to the environment we were put in. We really enjoyed going to the sets every morning and having fun and sometimes we had a bit too much fun making this film, but I think that’s one of Rohan’s fortes as a director that he doesn’t make you feel as you’re working and he prompts the actors to not take themselves too seriously at times and makes it a casual and relaxed place to be in. He makes you feel very normal about being in front of the camera which is great because you’re not conscious that you’re acting.
Those were actually the easiest scenes because Rohan would come and explain those scenes to me before the take and his comedic timing is brilliant and I tried to copy it. I couldn’t get it exactly but I tried! Usually you get a scene and you read it and think ‘oh my god, I can’t do this!’ but on this film before I even read the scene he would come and narrate it to me and completely convince me. When you see someone doing it so convincingly you just have to copy them and you know you can do it, so that’s how those scenes became what they are.
My favourite scene? Haha! Many! (thinks).
It’s very hard to choose which is a favourite scene, I like a lot of it because there’s something very sweet about the scenes and the moments he’s created are beautiful. I don’t really have a favourite scene, I like the whole film. But where the toughest scene is concerned it has to be the one in the bar with me and Arbaaz, that was the most difficult one to do. It’s the first time you see an unpleasant side of someone who’s usually a very happy and sweet guy. It’s the first time you see Raj hurt and trying to hit out at someone, he doesn’t really want to but he’s so upset that he has to. Now it’s very easy in a scene like that to get drunk and be really obnoxious because it takes place in a bar but we decided we weren’t going to do that. We wanted to try and play it in such a way that was layered with hurt but still trying to be polite while still making the point, which was a difficult balance to reach. That was very tough, it was the most difficult scene to do.
This is my first album that I can’t choose my favourite song because honestly they are all fantastic. If I try and pick one that I had the most fun in shooting, then in that respect for all of them I have such wonderful memories and moments of shooting them, but I particularly had a great time shooting the club song. We were shooting on the set in something like 55 degrees because there were 1000 lights, it was the peak of Summer and we were at Filmalaya Studios, so everything was against us but we all decided we were going to do this. There were around 500 people and it was so bad that after every take we’d have to change our clothes because they’d be soaking wet, but everyone just decided to have fun and we went completely crazy. So that was a lot of fun to shoot, but song-wise I think all the songs are exceptional.
Apart from the time we spent on the film, the amount of hard work we’ve put into it, it makes it difficult to look at a film objectively. I mean I’ve done films with new directors before and have worked with my friends but the other night we were watching the film and going through the outtakes and it brings back so many fond memories that remind you how close you are to this film. After a long time it’ll be felt that you’ve aided and been part of realising somebody’s dream and that’s what I felt after this film. I mean, I didn’t think of Rohan as a friend and someone I’ve known since I was a child but looked at it like: here’s a director and you can see through the film that he’s happy with what he’s got and you’ve helped him in whatever miniscule way and you’ve been a part of his dream, and that’s the biggest thing for me.
Fuad Omar.