Why SRK And I Are Falling Between The Cracks

SRK reminds you of a tired, slightly beaten Hank Moody driving into the sunset at the end of Season 4 of Californication. And to think there was a time Moody would have reminded you of Khan…

He has finally lost it, you’re thinking. It was only a matter of time that his narcissism went way over his head and it has happened now. Only a lunatic would compare himself to Shah Rukh Khan. And you might be right too, but just for the sake of argument, I pray that you let me finish. Plus, this isn’t just about me, it’s also about the average guy and as weird as it might sound – about Shah Rukh Khan too.

Read FHM India in the digital libraryEvery issue, every shoot, on TCG Media.

Truth be told, it’s tough for me to say SRK is falling between the cracks, tougher, even worse than the tax cheque I have just written or that time I smashed my car. It’s even worse to say that he is falling between the cracks of Aamir and Salman – especially the smug Aamir (I have refused to see an Aamir Khan movie since Rang De Basanti). But the truth is SRK is losing out to Salman’s unapologetic breed of Indian pulp and the debatably “alternative” Aamir Khan.

Unlike others, I have no qualms admitting I am a part of the SRK canon. I get just the slightest affronted when friends over dinner tell me about Dildo Pagal Hai a movie which I can only assume is about a woman pleasuring herself. I shed a silent tear for Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham and despite the crippling peer pressure to hate SRK, I remain hopelessly addicted to Baadshah and Yes Boss. The first time I met him for an interview was as a cub reporter in Mumbai in the year of the Mumbai floods. Simply because the gent heading my entertainment supplement decreed that someone not covering the Bollywood beat do the interview. I remember my sweaty palms and shaky knees and my subsequent pointing out that his black jacket didn’t match his black trousers. He laughed, sent home for another jacket, called me “young and stupid” and then told me not to move out of Mumbai for at least two years. I didn’t, but that’s another matter.

We live in times where there is a strangely inordinate emphasis on dissing SRK. Even though it’s difficult to pinpoint exactly where the chorus started, the great Indian Middle Class’ sudden love for thought-provoking cinema and by default Aamir Khan has something to do with it. Salman’s pulp superstardom though is a more recent phenomenon – it started with Wanted two years ago, leaving SRK to tread the middle path. And there isn’t much future in that, is there?

SRK for me is every bit the average bloke – he’s not too bulked up, nor is he scrawny. But he will step up to the plate if the role demands it (like he did for Om Shanti Om). He’s not excessively tall or too short and he admits that he can’t dance to save his life. He does not attach a deeper literary thought to a cup of tea, and doesn’t suddenly reinvent himself as an activist to coincide with movie releases. His linen shirts don’t have Hulk moments, he doesn’t hang his sunglasses behind his collar and he doesn’t make fart jokes. Tragically, it’s this that’s proving to be his undoing.

In less than half a decade after it started, the call to action to diss SRK is getting louder. You can no longer admit that you are fascinated with Ra.One without getting looks normally reserved for paedophiles. When you say you look forward to Don 2, people smile condescendingly and change the subject. You clearly have no taste in cinema they think. The generalisation doesn’t end there because you probably also have mediocre taste in music, haven’t read a book that wasn’t a comic and have no clue who Souza is.

The Salman clique has been cleverer. Not only have they crowned him a hero of the masses, they’ve also managed to make sure the multiplexes love him, even if they do it in tones more patronising than those doled out to Louis The Fifteenth.

He, many say, has played it too safe, not taken enough risks, not reinvented himself with every film. Even when he has, SRK the man has always been bigger than his celluloid avatars because they don’t take over his entire life, he doesn’t get behind counters to sell movie tickets and he doesn’t make grand gestures like making his bodyguard unveil his film promos. He remained unheedingly Shah Rukh. He took the safe path and 'safe' is disastrous. That’s the consensus.

His media friends who made a career out of writing about his time in the loo have also slowly exited the fold, choosing instead to write about his co-stars on the popular and alternative extremes. Or focusing on co-stars who are hopping from one camp to another with the agility of the Andhra Pradesh legislature. SRK, they will lead you to believe is bleeding friends. Apologetic editors place him on the Page 1 window only when Priyanka Chopra lands to celebrate her birthday with him – and if that doesn’t indicate just how deep the prejudice has seeped, then not much else will.

I like SRK because despite his billions and a bhagwan bharose cricket team, he remains fabulously relatable. Especially for those of us who find malls too commercial and the theatre crowd too pretentious, and those of us who don’t believe in shades of grey when it comes to girlfriends, but desperately seek the middle path when it comes to everything else. Tragically, I doubt either one of us is going to get by without picking a side soon.

From the August 2011 issue of FHM India.