Rajesh Khanna's 'Anand' taught me to appreciate cinema - Nikhil Dwivedi

Actor-producer Nikhil Dwivedi made headlines a while ago when he confirmed that he will be making a biopic on yesteryear superstar and late legend, Rajesh Khanna. Now, it seems the man wants to expedite the process of writing and casting of the film and plans to being work on the same this year itself.

Farah Khan is in talks to direct the film that will be  based on Gautam Chintamani’s book, Dark Star: The Loneliness of Being Rajesh Khanna. Nikhil’s adulation for the legendary actor dates back to the time when he was all of 10 or 11 years, when he watched Anand for the first time.

Talking about it with ETimes, Dwivedi said, “Anand blew my mind. It taught me to appreciate cinema at a time when I was a child of 10 or 11. My parents had shown the film to me. Anand made me follow Rajesh Khanna’s trajectory very closely. The term superstar was coined for him, looking at the enormous success he had at the box office. He had a regal personality. I remember meeting him once in 2001. This was before I became an actor. I was working on an awards event which gave me my sole chance to meet him. I met him in his office which had a large, life-sized portrait of him, welcoming visitors. The office was modest in size but it reflected his regality in every inch. These are small things but they talk about who you really are. I can’t imagine today what it would be like to meet the man in his youth, when he was the nation’s heartthrob. You could like him or dislike him but never ignore the fact that he remained a king till he bid farewell to us. Anand, Bawarchi, Sachha Jhoota, Avtaar, Namak Haram were fantastic pieces of work. Aradhana made him a star and it was a special film. He was earnest and it was visible that he was. Amar Prem is another favourite which impressed me a lot."

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Anand blew my mind. It taught me to appreciate cinema at a time when I was a child of 10 or 11.

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Given that Rajesh Khanna also had his own share of controversial episodes, would that make it to the two-hour biopic he’s planning? “What controversy are we speaking about here? If you see it, there is actually nothing controversial about Rajesh Khanna’s life. Whatever happened then had shock value only because of the period, the era in which it happened, and the way the society was those days. What was controversial then hardly makes people get up and take note today. For me, this film is about an achiever who at one time had seven different films enjoying long runs at the box office with numbers which today would run into hundreds of crores. The endeavour is to go into his achievements and not underline controversies,” he concluded.