Shabana Azmi, who is one of the most versatile actors that the country has had, recently recalled her fondness for Shashi Kapoor and the time when he was exceptionally mean to her, leaving her in tears. Shabana, who was a huge Shashi Kapoor fan since the age of 9 and saved up her pocket money to buy photos of him, recalled how when she was suddenly cast against him in the film Hira Aur Patthar, she was asked to do intimate scenes with him, which she refused and ran away from the set. It was at this time when a furious Shashi Kapoor showed up and scolded her. “When you said mummy mummy mai bhi actress banungi, tab tumhe yeh khayal nahi aaya.” He called her ‘stupid girl’, which left Shabana in tears. The actress also called the late actor “crazy.”
In an interview with Zoom, Shabana revealed how Shashi Kapoor was the only actor whose autograph she took on his photograph. The actress said, “I have been a fan of Shashi Kapoor since I think I was 9. When I was in school, he would come with his family every Sunday to Prithviraj Kapoor’s house and Prithviraj Kapoor was my immediate neighbour. So, I used to save on my pocket money and buy a black-and-white photo of Shashi Kapoor and every Sunday I would go and I would get it signed. He’s the only person whose autograph I took on his photograph. For me, when I was suddenly cast opposite him in Hira Aur Patthar, it was completely unbelievable and that the thing about Shashi was that he schooled me.”
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When asked why, the actress said, “That was his way of showing affection. He was crazy. I will give you an example, we were shooting for Fakira and the song was “Dil Mein Tujhe Bithakar”. Now, I went on set before he arrived and Satyanarayan ji was doing the choreography and I saw that the moves were very intimate and I was very young at that time and I had tears in my eyes and I left the set and my heart was thudding because I really didn’t want to do those shots. So I went in and I told my hairdresser that I can’t do those shots and I started crying. Suddenly there was heavy knocking on the door, comes Shashi Kapoor, he was like, ‘What’s wrong with you’, so I said, ‘I can’t do those scenes’, he said, ‘why, when you became actress and you said Mummy, mummy mai bhi actress banungi tab tumko khayal nahi aaya ki iss tarike ke cheezein tumko karna hai (didn’t you realise this when you told your family I want to become an actress), stupid girl’, and he left.”
She added, “I looked at my hair dresser and I said, ‘how mean is he, look at way he’s speaking to me.’ And then after half an hour, I went on the set and he had every move changed. This was the kind of person he was.”
The actress, who called her co-star ‘crazy’ for his way of showing affection also recalled how he played an important role while she was on a hunger strike supporting the slum dwellers and demanding an alternative accomodation for them, but never took credit for it.
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She said, “When I went on a hunger strike, nobody from the film industry came to visit me, but it was Shashi Kapoor who came to visit me. Then he said, ‘what is it that y’all want’, then we gave him a list of what we wanted. He went to SB Chavan, who was the CM then and he said to him, ‘listen, the film industry does so much for you and one of the main people from our industry is on a hunger strike so you have to do something about it’, and that’s how it was resolved. So, he came to us and he said, ‘the housing minister will come and tumko pani pilayenge and they are considering your demands.’ I was so touched and happy, because we were on a hunger strike for five days aur kuch nahi khaya na piya tha. On the stage, I said you just wait here, because we are going to announce this and when we said ki ‘Shashi Kapoor ji ka shukriya ada karte hai’, I saw him slinking away. I said, ‘Shashi ji come here’, he said, ‘no, it’s your victory’. I was so deeply touched. He was very special.”
After making her first film with her childhood idol in 1976, they reunited for many more films such as Hira Aur Patthar (1977), Chor Sipahee (1977), Atithee (1978) and Oonch Neech Beech (1989), among others.
Shashi Kapoor breathed his last on December 4, 2017, at the age of 79 after a prolonged illness. Recalling her last meeting with her favourite star, Shabana shared in the inteview, “When I saw him for the last time, he was in the hospital and when I looked at him, I knew I was meeting him for the last time because he had lost the will to live, which was very sad.”
Shabana Azmi was last seen in the film Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahani, where she was cast opposite Dharmendra.
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