Veteran action director and Vicky Kaushal‘s father Sham Kaushal has been in the movies for decades and seen the highs and lows of the business. In an earlier chat, he revealed there were moments in his career as a stuntman, and then as an action director, which were a little too risky. As a stuntman, Sham said that there was a stunt where he felt that he was pushing it too far. He said that even as an action director, he would sometimes feel like he would suffer a heart attack because he felt too anxious in executing those stunts.
Talking to Komal Nahta, Sham recalled performing one of the scariest stunts of his life and said, “I was doing a stunt where my body was on fire and I had to run and jump into a swimming pool. By the time, I was near the swimming pool, I was really feeling the heat. I had burnt my ears so I jumped into the pool before the mark from where I was originally supposed to jump. I could see the flame above me.”
When asked if such a situation every cropped up after he became an action director, Sham recalled two incidents from Om Shanti Om and Raavan where he was extremely stressed.
Talking about the fire scene in Farah Khan’s Om Shanti Om, which starred Shah Rukh Khan and Deepika Padukone, Sham said, “In Om Shanti Om, where there is a fire on the film’s set… The actors were on set, there were three cameras, 60 people from my team were also inside. We had to be very particular about the timing of lighting the fire and then dousing it because difference of one second can prove to be dangerous. These are the moments that kill you and you feel like you’re going to suffer a heart attack. I end up breaking down at times.”
He also recalled an action scene from Mani Ratnam’s Raavan, which was just as stressful. “In Mani Rathnam’s film’s climax scene, the bridge collapses and there is a fight sequence on it. We had constructed an actual bridge on the Malshej ghat and there was no way to get to it and the valley was 2000 feet deep. My stunt team used to first go and rehearse. We would make them wear a harness, drop them on the bridge by a crane, and make them rehearse. They would be brought back and then we would take the actors. These moments… they were killing me.”
Sham Kaushal as been an action director for over 40 years. His sons – actors Vicky and Sunny Kaushal – are leading actors in Hindi movies.
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