84 Years Young, No Plan To Retire!

When this writer wishes him a happy celebratory birthday, Indian cinema’s biggest superstar replies, “What is there to celebrate? It’s a day like any other day? I’m grateful that I’m still working, that my body is able to keep pace with my spirit,” he says humbly, urging his well-wishers to wish and pray for his good health.

Bachchan saab recalls his childhood birthdays when his father, the great poet Harivansh Rai Bachchan, would always write and recite a poem for him. “It was a family tradition. But this tradition took an entirely new definition when, after my near-fatal accident in 1984 (when Mr Bachchan nearly lost his life after a mis-aimed punch in his solar plexus while shooting Manmohan Desai’s Coolie), my father recited my birthday poem. It was like a new life for me. While reading the poem, my father broke down. It was the only time I’ve seen him like that.”

Amitabh Bachchan has a long way to go before he retires.

“Why should I think of giving up?” he asks. He has been seriously indisposed a number of times. “I have come to the jaws of death and then been pulled back. Someone somewhere has protected me all these years.”

About his longevity as an actor, he says, “I have no idea about what sells and what doesn’t. I’m bad with economics and finance. I’ve never known how to market myself. But I think if you look at my career graph, you’ll see there have been very few other actors with this kind of variety. I started with K.A. Abbas and Hrishikesh Mukherjee doing more sensitive cinema. Then Salim-Javed wrote my more commercial films. Wherever there was a Deewaar, there was an Amar Akbar Anthony. Where there was a Muqaddar Ka Sikandar, there was also a Chupke Chupke. I have done a more serious kind of cinema in Saudagar and Main Azaad Hoon to countermand criticisms of over-commercialisation.”

He’s content doing the work that he is! “I’ve now found acceptability as a senior character. So I’m taking it from there.”

Any plans for direction? “I can’t even dream of it because I don’t even know the craft well enough. Other creative people throw a gauntlet at me and I pick it up. But that’s it. It’s difficult for me to go beyond that. On the sets, I provide inputs when I feel strongly about it and then leave it to the director to accept or reject my suggestions.

”Opening up about being turned down on set, he added, “Most of the time, they reject my inputs. And happily, those films have done well. So I feel my suggestions are not worth taking. Otherwise, all my directors have been extremely compliant. But I haven’t been a difficult actor to work with. I always believe the director is the captain of the ship.”

Any unfulfilled wishes?

“Oh, lots! To play the piano. To work with Guru Dutt. To spend more time with my family.”