In an exclusive Lehren Retro interview, Suresh Oberoi reveals Amjad Khan's critique of his role in 'Ek Baar Phir'. Uncover Bollywood's past controversies with Bharathi S Pradhan.
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00:00 What was it like working with Vinod Khanna?
00:03 Vinod was very nice.
00:05 He didn't have these complexes that some of the other heroes had?
00:09 That his voice is so good that...
00:12 Your voice was even better than his.
00:14 Now, who doesn't have it?
00:18 Everyone has it, right?
00:20 A little jealousy, a little love...
00:22 I would have felt jealous if the artist in front of me was doing so well and I was doing so little.
00:29 It happens.
00:31 In one small film, Chutput, I don't even remember who the actor was.
00:35 He didn't say anything to me.
00:38 He said, "I will be in your place, you will be in my place. I am leaving the film."
00:44 And he left.
00:45 And I didn't even know him. I was not even introduced.
00:48 He left because you were better than him?
00:51 No, but he could speak.
00:53 In front of you?
00:54 He could speak in dialogue.
00:56 I didn't know what had happened. It was blank.
00:58 And did he come back?
00:59 And he said that he will come back?
01:01 No, he said that he will come back in front of me in some other film.
01:04 He didn't come back?
01:05 No, I didn't see him.
01:07 It happens when it has to happen.
01:12 But I am so surprised, you know, Suresh.
01:15 I never thought people would have this kind of insecurities.
01:18 I don't know if there are insecurities.
01:20 I don't know. Now, personally, in the film, in the studio, who played a role?
01:29 I was playing a police officer, I don't remember who was it.
01:32 I saw Amjad, I was a great fan of his.
01:34 I went to meet him, I said, "Sir, I am Suresh Oberoi."
01:37 "Oh, you are the same."
01:40 "Put it again."
01:42 "Are we superstars like this? Do you show this?"
01:47 In 2021, I was in tears in public.
01:51 That also I have seen in my life.
01:53 It's okay.
01:55 But that was a role you did.
01:57 Anand Sagar explained it to me.
02:00 You can't speak like this.
02:02 Because you can't be subjective, objective.
02:05 Whatever you said, you said it well.
02:07 He said, "No, you can't do that."
02:10 So you mean to say you played a very spoiled superstar in Ek Baar Phir.
02:16 But that was a role, right?
02:17 No, he said, "You have shown it too much, in low light."
02:20 "Girls, this money, asking for dollars."
02:23 "People are coming with jewellery."
02:25 Pandey had done a little more.
02:27 Dinod Pandey.
02:29 Okay.
02:30 So I said only one line to him.
02:32 I said it at the end.
02:34 I said, "Sir, tell me one thing."
02:36 "The one who doesn't have five pounds in his pocket."
02:38 "If someone comes and says, 'I will give you money, make you a hero and take you to London.'"
02:43 "Did you leave at that time?"
02:45 Then he said, "Yeah, you are right."
02:50 "If he had done dharm, it would have been right. If he had done wrong, it would have been wrong."
02:53 "Newcomer, okay."
02:55 "If you have any work, I am always there for you."
02:59 Later, it changed.
03:01 "It's not like that. Any problem, I am there."
03:03 He really said, "I don't have five pounds in my pocket."
03:08 "And I have to play a superstar."
03:10 "And I didn't even have a passport."
03:14 I went to the passport office and begged him.
03:17 I said, "I am getting a role, sir. Please give it to me."
03:20 This is for you to shoot Vinod Pandey's film Burberry in London.
03:24 How does destiny work?
03:27 I went to meet Sippy.
03:29 Which Sippy?
03:31 Daddu.
03:32 Daddu is Raj Sippy.
03:34 I went to meet Sippy.
03:37 From someone's office, Koko was coming out.
03:42 Kuljit Singh.
03:44 I knew him from the institute.
03:47 I met him once.
03:49 He was not in my batch.
03:51 I was not in his batch. He was a senior.
03:53 I went to the institute and met him.
03:57 I said, "How is the work going?"
04:00 "I am very worried."
04:02 "I get modeling, sometimes I get radio."
04:04 "I don't have a role."
04:06 "And I am fed up of struggling."
04:08 He said, "I got a role."
04:11 "A Pandey man has come."
04:14 I still remember that.
04:16 "In Pochkanwala street, there is a flat."
04:20 Pochkanwala.
04:22 I found his number. He gave it to me.
04:28 I came home.
04:30 I called him from a coin box.
04:34 I said, "Hello."
04:35 Pandey picked up.
04:37 I said, "Sir, you are looking for a hero."
04:39 He said, "I don't look like a hero."
04:41 "I have a big moustache."
04:43 At that time, the moustache was not so big.
04:45 Shammi Kapoor and Raj Kapoor.
04:47 Everybody was clean shaven.
04:49 Shashi ji.
04:51 Mainly.
04:53 He said, "Come and meet me."
04:55 I asked him.
04:57 The shopkeepers were lying there.
04:59 I asked him, "How much does it cost to take a taxi from here?"
05:03 He said, "30 rupees."
05:05 I said, "Sir, come now."
05:07 He came and went home.
05:09 I told Yashi, "It will cost 30 rupees."
05:13 "Come. You must be tired at night."
05:15 "Then it will cost 30 rupees."
05:17 "And it will cost 60 rupees."
05:19 "50 rupees is enough to run the house in a week."
05:21 "How can it cost 60 rupees?"
05:23 Yashi said, "Go."
05:25 I went there.
05:29 He had such a big moustache.
05:31 I asked him, "What should I do with it?"
05:35 He said, "Sir, how will I remember it?"
05:37 "Let me take it home."
05:39 "No. Keep this mic and I will read it."
05:41 "You keep saying the dialogues."
05:43 So,
05:45 he said a line.
05:47 "Friends, friends."
05:51 A little off.
05:53 I had learnt how to speak on mic and radio from Brij Bhushan.
05:59 Brij Bhushan was married to Meena Kumar's sister, Madhu Balas.
06:07 So, Brij Bhushan introduced you to the various ways of using the mic and throwing your voice?
06:13 No, no. Brij Bhushan taught me how to stand in front of the mic and how to modulate.
06:19 He said, "Voices are of many people."
06:22 "You have to do it like this."
06:24 "You have to put this feeling and this."
06:26 Like a Guru to a disciple.
06:28 So, I used all those techniques and spoke the dialogues better than Pandey.
06:34 I was trained by that.
06:36 So, he said, "I feel something, like fire."
06:42 I said, "I was praying inside, that I get the picture."
06:46 Later he said, "We give weekly payment."
06:48 "Sir, contract."
06:50 I said, "Whatever you give."
06:52 Finally, he liked it and asked me if I have a passport.
06:56 I said, "Yes."
06:58 How the universe helps.
07:03 Things are already predestined.
07:06 Because I didn't even know what we were doing.
07:09 We were just walking on the road, my wife and me.
07:11 I met a Sindhi guy who was a few blocks away.
07:15 I said, "What do you do?"
07:17 He said, "I make passports for people."
07:20 I said, "Okay. You have a travel agency."
07:22 I said, "Very good. You can do it for me."
07:25 My wife started laughing.
07:27 She said, "What do you know?"
07:29 "If a producer says you have to go out, you have to have a passport."
07:34 There was not even a single picture at that time.
07:37 Finally, I gave money to him to fill in the form.
07:44 I filled the form.
07:47 After I came back, I remembered from Pandey's house.
07:51 I remembered suddenly, "Oh, I gave him money."
07:54 I went to his house.
07:56 He said, "It will take a lot of time."
07:59 I said, "Fill it."
08:02 He filled the form and gave me the documents.
08:05 I went there to the passport office.
08:09 It seemed like a third-class train was rushing more than Andheri station.
08:16 It was a rush.
08:18 Nobody knew how.
08:21 I asked, "Who is coming? Who is going? Where is the passport office?"
08:25 There was no question of the old days.
08:28 I reached there.
08:30 That guy was looking at me.
08:32 "What?" I said.
08:34 "Are you mad?"
08:35 He asked me in two days.
08:37 "Okay."
08:38 I said, "Sir, it's a question of my career."
08:40 He said, "Okay. Come day after tomorrow."
08:45 Okay.
08:47 I got my passport in two days.
08:49 In those days, in the 80s.
08:51 Fantastic.
08:53 That's how, when things have to fall into place, they just do.
08:56 Isn't it?
08:58 This is God's will.
08:59 Kuku told you about this offer from Vinod Pandey.
09:02 And you went to Vinod Pandey.
09:03 And before that I was getting trained.
09:05 You were getting trained in your voice.
09:07 And also getting money from him.
09:08 But Ek Baar Phir was a very strong film, isn't it?
09:12 It shook everyone.
09:15 Women loved it.
09:17 It was just some kind of a liberation for them.
09:21 But you played a very toxic superstar in that.
09:25 And a bad husband in that.
09:26 He was a bad man.
09:28 Yeah, he was a bad man.
09:30 Nobody did that for me.
09:33 Kamal Jit didn't say anything.
09:35 Hari bhai didn't say anything.
09:36 Everyone didn't say anything.
09:37 That's why I...
09:39 That's why you got it.
09:40 Which is good for you.
09:42 But did that also help to further consolidate you as a bad man?
09:48 No, that made a lot of...
09:52 Secretaries in those days used to control the heroines a lot.
09:56 They used to say, "He has done a very bad film.
09:59 Your image will be ruined."
10:00 And if you tell a girl that her image will be ruined,
10:02 she will say, "No, no."
10:03 And no hero will say anything to you.
10:05 So secretaries were influencing the heroines.
10:08 No, but secretaries had the belief system in them.
10:11 That a hero is a hero.
10:13 A judge's son is a judge.
10:15 A police officer's son is a police officer.
10:17 If there is a role, then there is a role.
10:19 It's fixed.
10:21 Yeah.
10:23 They used to use the word "image".
10:26 This is his image.
10:27 That's where that word "typecasting" came also.
10:30 Typecasting image was there.
10:31 That's right.
10:33 [Music]
10:40 you