There was also talk in the middle that the role should be completed by putting prosthetics on Ranbir Kapoor.
Shivani Agarwal
Special conversation: Veteran late actor Rishi Kapoor’s last film ‘Sharmaji Namkeen’ is releasing next week on Amazon Prime. Rishi fell ill during the shooting of this film. Then the time of Kovid had arrived. After that Rishi died before he could complete his work by resuming the film. Further, the character of Sharmaji is played by Paresh Rawal. This is the first Hindi film where two veteran actors played the same character. Suhail Nayyar and Taruk Raina are in the role of Sharmaji’s sons. Suhail shared many memorable information about that last act of Rishi Kapoor with Dainik Bhaskar.
Suhail said, “Rishi ji had shot almost 65 per cent. After that Paresh ji came on board. Although Paresh ji will do it, the makers took a long time to decide on that. It took some eight to nine months. That is to complete it then how to do it? Whether to reshoot the whole film or take the help of animation? There was also talk in the middle that the role should be completed by putting prosthetics on Ranbir Kapoor. Then finally the makers decided that we Leave it to the audience to get that character played by some other artist. Luckily it has happened. After a point it doesn’t seem that Sharmaji is being played by two different people.”
Rishi used to make the actors comfortable on the set with the talk of food and drink
Due to Rishi Kapoor’s seniority, Suhail and Taruk used to be very scared of him. Then the sage himself made him comfortable. Suhail says, “He started feeling that we were not getting comfortable with him. So he started talking to us on the topic of food during the shoot break. Apart from food, cricket and current affairs started talking about him. He started his shooting in Kashmir. He used to share stories related to how Nadru used to eat yakhni, a local dish of Kashmir. Usually, all their conversations used to be around food.”
Know a lot about him by reading his biography
Suhail further explains, “I also read Rishi ji’s biography after his death, from which I learned a lot. He shared the things written in it with young actors like us on the set before his death. Rishi ji told us personally on the set. That was how when he was just 15 years old, his father took permission from his mother and cast him in ‘Mera Naam Joker’.
Also used to give cue for the scenes of junior actors
Suhail also mentions Rishi’s strength and how he himself used to support the juniors. Suhail said, “Usually senior actors who are senior actors leave after giving their shots. But Rishi ji used to stay on the sets even after shooting his portions. He himself would give cue for close-up shots of us like Even after all these years, his professional attitude was not lacking. Many times he stopped during the shoot and gave me the cue in that scene.
Paresh Rawal gave his color to the role of Sharmaji
Rishi also saw Suhail’s film ‘Hotel Mumbai’ to know his skills. Suhail said, “He took my number after that. He had also taken Taruk Raina’s number. He had also given the reason that he could refer any maker in our name again. However, that proved to be our last conversation. Later when When Paresh Rawal ji took over his role, he said that he will give full due credit to this role. For his sake, he will not mimic Rishi Kapoor ji. Instead he will give his color to that role.”
