Inside Bollywood

The Greatest Show On Earth: Writings On Bollywood
Edited by Jerry Pinto
Penguin
2011, pp 452
499

The book, The Greatest Show on Earth, to quote the editor, “believes that it must be eclectic because Bollywood at its best was eclectic”, has been divided into six distinct parts: The Stars, The Films and Film Makers, The Music and Music Makers, The Gossip, Ringside Views, The Fiction.

Jerry Pinto has succeeded all the way in revoking nostalgia; culled out vintage gems from various published sources from the past to showcase the magical world of mainstream Hindi cinema, what makes it tick, and how impossible is made acceptable.

He conjures up images of triumphs and tragedies; break-ups and reunions; the grime behind the glitter; rivalries, brickbats and showdowns. The resourced material encapsulates much, though not all. There are those glaring missing links about which the editor hasn’t been apologetic at all, issues that have been left out in the cold, stars and filmmakers who do not find a place even in the footnotes.

Satyajit Ray borrowed money from Kishore Kumar to complete Pather Panchali; Meena Kumari walked into Gulzar’s arms without even saying goodbye to husband Kamal Amrohi; Amitabh Bachchan over-rode directors who made him what he was, turned a ‘dictator’ and ‘fascist’ after success; Dara Singh spoke better in English than he did in Hindi; variation in the narratives of Dev Anand and R K Narayan on the making of Guide; Kidar Sharma’s description of Nargis’s mother Jaddan Bai as “a large woman with a heavy bosom and matching hips”, the split between B R and Yash Chopra, and the latter’s romantic dalliances with actors Sadhna, Nanda, and Mumtaz — particularly the latter; Manmohan Desai’s take on the making of Coolie involving 3,000 junior artistes and the fatal Bachchan accident, and the maker’s cutting-edge sense of humour.

Suketu Mehta’s descriptions of caste and class system amongst junior artistes: “If an actor in a party scene is wearing a suit, he is considered A-class and gets paid double the amount that goes to another actor relegated to C-class because he is standing behind the A-class actor…”; the highs and lows in the life of Helen who, despite her talent, failed to rise above being the villain’s mole in a career extending three decades; the mad methodology behind A R Rahman “who shuts himself in a room when he composes”, musicians ignorant about time, “from a few minutes to a few hours” to record a song; in his heydays ace composer S D Burman charged only one-third of what others like Shankar-Jaikishen, O P Nayyar and Madan Mohan did and Shakti Samanta went to him only because “he couldn’t afford Shankar-Jaikishen”.

‘The Gossip’ section opens with Saadat Hasan Manto’s no-holds-barred description of Sitara Devi as a man-eater, and likens her to “a typical five-storey (written sometime in the mid-forties of the last century) Bombay high-rise with many flats and rooms, all inhabited. It is a fact that she had the ability to be involved with many men at the same time. Shobha De, in her inimitable style, tears to pieces “Quintessential sex symbol” Zeenat Aman who had her cleavage “unenhanced by silicone but attractively pushed up with clever underwiring that apparently gave Gina Lollobrigida a complex”, who came to films “to make money, cash in on her body, enjoy fame…she met her objectives and plotted her career moves ruthlessly.”

The truth about Dharmendra-Hema Malini and the scandal involving Dilip Kumar’s second marriage, the little known romance between Asha Bhosle and Dada Kondke — of Andheri Raat Mein Diya Tere Haath Mein notoriety — how a reluctant Balraj Sahni became a part of Bollywood, and such interesting details form a part of this enjoyable book together with a semi-fictional take on Guru Dutt’s life; Salman Rushdie’s short story placed in the film industry; an extract from K A Abbas’s novelisation of Bobby screenplay; Bhupen Kakkar’s fantasia and Shobha De’s fictional account of Rekha’s career.

Curiosity is what the ultimate scoring point is. On that count the book succeeds only partially. But then, that is what it is about Hindi cinema. It can never be contained even in a huge compendium that has everything in one place.