Anupam Kher pic: Arunchandra Bose

When Anupam Kher visited Dubai, which has a sizeable Malayali population, recently, he was mobbed at the airport and the streets by people who wanted to congratulate him on his superlative performance in Pranayam, which also won him an award.

“The film was brilliant and Blessy’s handling of the subject was amazing. When a movie touches the core of an audience, it goes beyond a performance and becomes surreal. Those moments cannot be isolated from the contents of the film.”

The actor says that he has not done a Malayalam film since then because a role as good as the one in Pranayam has not come his way.

The actor was in Kochi to release his book, The Best Thing About You Is You, at the International DC book fair and a day earlier he was part of a stage performance in Thrissur. Beega hua aadmi baarish se nahin darta is a line from his book. A talk with him shows that he preaches what he practises.

What many probably do not know is that the actor, who is now busy with four upcoming Bollywood releases, was afflicted with facial paralysis when he was acting in Hum Aapke Hain Kaun! “Life challenges you, tests you and sees whether you can deal with the curves it throws,” he says. “You can choose to defy what could have become your eternal weakness.

I was advised two months’ rest when a huge set was made for shooting an important scene from Hum Aapke Hain Kaun. If I had run away that would have been the benchmark of my life. So I faced life head on and acted in the movie. If you look closely at the scene with a pillow, you will only notice long shots.”

Be it comedy, mainstream or anti-hero, he has played it all. “Ask me if there are any more characters left to play and even after 40 years, the answer will be 100 more roles are still left. I find doing comedy difficult because it is not only emotional but also a craft.

Everyone at some time would have faced tragedies of some sort and so emulating tragedy is not difficult but getting people to laugh is a very physical expression and requires perfect timing.”

Anupam, who runs the acting institute Actor Prepares and has many illustrious students including Deepika Padukone, has this advice for aspiring actors: “Failure is multi-dimensional but success is single dimensional.

If you are first, then you have the perennial terror of holding on to that position but if you are 10th you have the option of becoming third, second or first. People frighten you with your shortcomings but if you don’t think of them as shortcomings, then nothing can bother you.”