Bollywood Dreams : Part 1

King of Bollywood: Shah Rukh Khan and the Seductive World of Indian Cinema
by Anupama Chopra

Here is the astonishing true story of Bollywood, a sweeping portrait about a country finding its identity, a movie industry that changed the face of India, and one man's struggle to become a star.

Shah Rukh Khan's larger than life tale takes us through the colorful and idiosyncratic Bollywood movie industry, where fantastic dreams and outrageous obsessions share the spotlight with extortion, murder, and corruption.

Khan broke into this $1.5 billion business despite the fact that it has always been controlled by a handful of legendary film families and sometimes funded by black market money. As a Muslim in a Hindu majority nation, exulting in classic Indian cultural values, Shah Rukh Khan has come to embody the aspirations and contradictions of a complicated culture tumbling headlong into American style capitalism. His story is the mirror to view the greater Indian story and the underbelly of the culture of Bollywood.

Chapter 1

Dreams come true in Dalton. The small, unimposing town in Georgia, mostly known as the carpet capital of the world, is a setting for miracles. Bhavesh Sheth knows that.

Bhavesh, a portly, spectacled man with curly hair and an eager manner, stands out in Dalton. He is among the handful of Indians living there; only 2 percent of the town's 27,912 residents are Asian. Many of these are doctors, but Bhavesh is in the motel business. His father, Ramesh, runs a Super 8 Motel located near the Dalton Convention Center. It is a family business. Ramesh is the general manager and Bhavesh the assistant manager. Their wives also help to manage the two-star, 102-unit motel.

Bhavesh has never lived in India. His father emigrated in the early 1970s, and Bhavesh was born in Canada in 1974. Ramesh went where there was work. Bhavesh grew up in Detroit, Houston, and Tennessee. He visited India with his parents when money and time permitted. But in 1999, in accordance with his parents' wishes, Bhavesh had an arranged marriage with Tejal, a girl born and brought up in Gujarat.

Like millions of Indians across the world, Bhavesh connected with India through Hindi films. His parents watched them regularly, usually on video. The grainy pirated prints couldn't take away from the power of these fantasies. Each time Amitabh Bachchan died artfully on-screen, Bhavesh, only nine, wept copious tears. Ramesh assured him that India's most enduring superstar was only "faking it." As he grew older, Bhavesh continued to watch Hindi films avidly. Tejal was also a fan. Their son Kishan, born in 2002, was seduced by song-and-dance before he could talk. So when Temptation 2004, a Bollywood rock concert performed by some of Mumbai's leading actors, came to the Gwinnett Center in Atlanta, there was little choice. Bhavesh cashed in his birthday and marriage anniversary gifts and bought tickets at $150 each. By the time he called, the best seats at $200 were already sold out.

Temptation was a typically Bollywood blend of actors lip-synching popular songs and dance performances interspersed with comedy routines and fan interactions. It featured six leading stars, each enacting a different temptation. The biggest draw was superstar Shah Rukh Khan. The two-month-long tour was sold out in sixteen cities across Europe, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Canada. Each venue, with seating ranging from 7,000 to 20,000, was packed. The most expensive tickets were between $300 and $400, but the steep prices did not deter fans. In Toronto, so many people were turned away from the gargantuan Air Canada Centre, which seats 19,800, that a second show had to be organized three days later. In London, two shows were done back to back. In Antwerp, the hall was packed with immigrants. These were Indians who had immigrated to Holland via its erstwhile colony Suriname, where Indians were shipped between 1873 and 1916 as indentured labor. Being several generations removed from India had not diminished their passion for Bollywood.

It was, as filmmaker Nasreen Munni Kabir documented in her film The Outer World of Shah Rukh Khan, Elvis-level hysteria. Fans speaking in thick American accents kept vigil in hotel lobbies at 2 A.M. to catch a glimpse of their favorite star. At the shows, weeping girls screamed, "We love you, Shah Rukh Khan!" Local organizers said they were refusing $2,000 offers for backstage passes. Time magazine's Asian edition, which featured Shah Rukh on the cover of the Asia's Heroes special issue the following month, reported that Shah Rukh's bodyguard, a burly bald man with two teenage daughters, had so many offers of sex in exchange for access that it had become "disturbing" for him.

On September 3, 13,000 people filled the cavernous arena at Gwinnett Center to capacity. Bhavesh, Tejal, Kishan, and Bhavesh's brother Rupesh drove in from Dalton. Bhavesh was carrying a printout from Yahoo! Maps in his pocket. When Tejal asked him why he was holding on to the piece of paper, Bhavesh replied, "You never know. I might go onstage and meet Shah Rukh Khan. Then I'll get an autograph for Kishan." A week before the concert, Bhavesh had told Tejal that he had a dream that he was dancing onstage with Shah Rukh. Tejal had laughed and remarked that there was no way that was going to happen.

They were seated twelve rows away from the stage. As part of the act, Shah Rukh selected two audience members to do a routine with him. A girl who had won a raffle contest was called first. Then Shah Rukh announced that he was looking for a man who could dance. Something came over Bhavesh. He told Tejal that he had a crazy idea that was likely to embarrass her. Tejal, by then giddy with the glamour, said she didn't care. So Bhavesh, who weighs 200 pounds and is five foot nine inches tall, stood on his seat and started to do the Bhangra, a robust North Indian dance. Shah Rukh pointed at him and said, "You, over there, come onstage."

The realization that he was actually going to dance on a stage with Shah Rukh Khan didn't sink in immediately. Bhavesh stood still on his chair, confused. Was Shah Rukh calling to him or someone else? Tejal yelled, "Go before they call someone else!" Bhavesh ran. His legs were moving, but his mind wasn't fully alert. He was in shock. Bhavesh clambered up onstage, panting, holding his heart, overcome by the intensity of emotions rushing through him. Tejal thought he was going to start crying.

When Shah Rukh handed him the mike, Bhavesh said, "I had a dream seven days ago that I would dance in Atlanta with Shah Rukh Khan. I swear to God. My wife wouldn't believe me. She said, 'You're crazy, Bhavesh.' I said, 'Goddamnit, it's going to happen.'" Shah Rukh listened with the indulgent smile of a much-loved deity and replied, "I'm very touched, but as a guy you should be dreaming of naked women." Then Bhavesh mumbled, "I must do this; don't get insulted." And in the ultimate Indian gesture of reverence and respect, one reserved for family elders and men of God, Bhavesh bent down and touched Shah Rukh Khan's feet.

Copyright © 2007 by Anupama Chopra

About the Author

I belong to a family steeped in Hindi film. My mother Kamna Chandra sowed the Bollywood seed. She wrote scripts for two of Bollywood's finest directors: Raj Kapoor and Yash Chopra. My siblings followed in her footsteps: my sister Tanuja Chandra is one of the few women directors in the Hindi film industry. My brother Vikram Chandra is a renowned novelist (Sacred Games) who has also written film scripts. I am a film critic. And I'm married to Vidhu Vinod Chopra, a well-know Hindi film director whose short film, An Encounter with Faces, was nominated for an Oscar in 1979.