I wish I could have done more for children's films in India: Amol Palekar

The recently concluded third edition of Banaras Literature Festival was marked by an array of activities. During one of the sessions, the audience was taken on a nostalgia trip by veteran actor Amol Palekar, who shared some interesting bits from his life in conversation with writer and lyricist Neelesh Mishra.
The Baton Baton Mein actor said, “My entire life is full of some beautiful accidents, right from starting as a painting artist, to theatre and then venturing into films. Whatever I had done in any of these domains has never been accorded by the popular opinion but I have done what I personally liked or what I have learnt from the veterans of the field.”

The actor revealed that he started off with an aspiration to become a painter. “After completing my Matric I joined Sir JJ School of Art and did a five-year course in fine arts and did a Post Graduation in Mural. Within a year of passing this course, I could do a solo painting show thanks to the great artist KH Ara who cancelled his show at Taj Art Gallery to ensure that I was given an opportunity to showcase my work.”
When asked whether films like Rajnigandha disrupt the mainstream cinema at that time, he replied, “Now looking back it was a renaissance period in every sphere whether it was art, painting, architecture, literature, music. The kind of changes that happened in our country from 70s to 90s was phenomenal and I was privileged to be part of this change. The best part was that the seasoned artists of all these fields used to communicate with each other. There was no element of hostility between them. Artist like MF Hussain used to make sets for theatre and Pt Ravi Shankar used to compose music for films. This kind of exchange was huge during that time and it is natural that parallel or what we term as middle-of-the-road cinema, originated during that period.”

Speaking on his collaboration with Nana Patekar, Amol Palekar said while directing the film Thodasa Roomani Ho Jayen, Nana said he had heard that I was making a film and why don’t I cast him? I replied that the character in the film was not aggressive like him so it does not suit him. But he insisted on being given a chance. He also insisted on rehearsing for the role and if after that also, I did not like his acting, he will accept it. I agreed as I was not expecting him to even turn up the next day. But he came and rehearsed for the entire wee. The kind of change I could see in Nana was really different from what he was known for. The much calmer Nana we see today began at the time of Thodasa Roomani Ho Jayen.”
The actor said that he has no regrets about his film journey, “As I have been able to what I always wanted on my terms. Although there are certain mistakes which I have made. As president of the Children’s Film Society of India, after some disagreement with the officials I resigned along with the entire council. The then Prime Minister called me and said that in case you have any problem you contact me and do not resign. I thought if for even a small issue I have to call the PM then there is something wrong with the system. I wanted to draw attention to the problem so that it can be resolved but I remained determined on my resignation. Today I feel that if I had not taken that step then I would have been able to do something for the children’s films. I wish I could have done more in that area.”

‘I had my doubts about the story of Rajnigandha’
Before doing Rajnigandha, Basu Chatterjee had approached me for a film Piya Ka Ghar for which I had refused, so I was quite surprised when he again came to me for Rajnigandha. Basuda was a brilliant filmmaker but when it came to narrating a story he was not good at it. While narrating the story of Rajnigandha he said there is a boy in the story which is you and a girl, who is a newcomer Vidya Sinha and then handed me a one-and-a-half-page story of Mannu Bhandari. After reading the story I had several questions for him. ‘How will you make a full-feature film on just this short story, where there is no villain or drama in the film and the hero never ever expresses his love in the film?’ Basuda in his characteristic style just smiled at me and said ‘this is a different kind of film, would you like to work in this’ and I said yes to him.

I didn’t want to work with Hrishida
“Hrishikesh Mukherjee called me and said that he was making a new film and wanted to meet me. While going for the meeting I was thinking of ways to say no to him since I had heard that he was very strict. On reaching his place I was given a very warm welcome and he narrated me the story of the film Gol Maal. I thought it will be a very novel experience to work on such a film and I accepted his offer. Later, I told him that I had planned to say no to him and hearing this he said he had plans of making five films with me. He narrated to me the story of all the five films. Out of the five films we eventually made four together.”