I - Actor Kamal Haasan on cinema, his oeuvre and why it is important that he is indeed, himself!

On cinema and what it means to him

I think writers, actors (those in the arts), they use it for self-analysis. I use it for myself. The rest of it makes for merely great copy. For me, let me confess that in the whole universe, the central point is me. For without me, I cannot realize or even understand what is happening around me. It will be wrong to play the humility game in a situation so primal as this one.
If you ask me what cinema means to me, it means `cure’. Cure for my ailments, my sickness, my sadness, my personal anger is quenched, drenched, cooled down, my hunger for applause, my need to speak out something vociferously is satisfied…
There are different kinds of anger - everyone goes through it and all that anger stems from the fact that you are angry with yourself… it is your failing. These are the things that cinema helps me analyse. It is as good as religion for me. This is what religion does to the common man – stops him from going mad. If religion is important for him, then cinema is important to me.

On when he first recognised his hunger for applause

When I first walked, my mother(must have) applauded. Perhaps that’s where it began. All of us hunger for it. You love applause too. You haven’t heard it in that tone I have, of two hands meeting, loudly. Everybody hungers for it I think – they like it. It is just that I am fine-tuned towards it, because of my profession and it has a phonetic expression for me.

On critics and criticism

I don’t believe in what the critics say, be it encomiums or negative criticism. In both cases most of them are ill-informed. Here, I am talking about a journalistic critic who is self-conscious and is performing for an audience. So he is editing some of his honesty, ego, camouflaging some of his ego (to write his critique). I discovered this from a friend, a critic, who would put down his pen and have a private chat with me… And also listening to him on a private platform is easier for me… So I don’t take them all too seriously.
I am yet to find somebody telling me a point that is so pertinent that it will change my life.

On his career, where he is now

Where I am, I am late, I know. I have missed a couple of buses. For example, Marudhanayagam could(at the peril of humility!) possibly been like Ang Lee’s film in the West, but much more stronger, like The Passion of the Christ… I sort of punch my fist to my palm and say I missed that bus. It’s still there but it should have been done in ‘98-‘99. I had everything in place except for the finance. I needed ten million and I could never have raised it in India.

On professionalism in cinema

I love Tamilians, I am one. But there is a kind of moffusil clamour, a shandy clamour in business(here), that is no good. There were people who showed professionalism - Vasan had it. Even Meiyappa Chettiar had it. Nagi Reddy has it. L V prasad whose grandson is producing this film(Vasool Raja MBBS), he had it. He built an empire and from my childhood, I have seen it being built and grow into such a mammoth tree that I could rest in its shade.

On cinema and personal life

It’s like the farmer – he lives on the field. Where does his work begin? A lazy farmer will start work whenever he feels like and becomes frantic at harvest time. As for me, I do try to catch everything, but sometimes, I do miss rain and sometimes Nature fails me.
Fortunately, cinema is a versatile medium unlike computer language or programming or surgery or accountancy. They work hard on weekdays and look forward to Saturday and Sunday… There’s disciplined holiday time.
I don’t know how to take a holiday. Life has been one big holiday for the past twenty years when I made some changes – very firm rules, I will do only what I feel comfortable with. Think a lot about it - even if it’s a wrong move, if I enjoy it, it feels good, it is not upto my intellect, I will still do it… and Munnabai(Vasool Raja in Tamil) is one. This is not a film I can (take)pride in after a Hey Ram. But I think it is fun. So what if you are a Schoppenhuer, a Socrates or a Bernard Shaw… your wit and smile should never leave you…

On the roles he would like to play

I am like a reader, if you ask him what he wants to read, he will not be telling you the truth if he choose just one subject. Browsing in a book shop, he buys what he can afford. But if you gave him the choice, he would like to buy everything. That’s the choice I have – but what pushes me to a film is the logistics of the moment. But otherwise, I like comedy. I think comedy is very serious business.
I think(it is) only when you know how to laugh, that you know how to cry…

On real life and being Kamal Haasan

I snoop around like a spy… I watch life that way, because life becomes self-conscious when I am around as a star. It is a handicap. You have to look at a star with that compassion because they have lost touch and very few know that they should try and keep in touch. That is the reason why many turn to drugs, get lost or commit suicide.
I don’t regret it but it is a requirement for me, I want it this way, I wanted this altitude. Now I can’t complain about the thinness of air.

On `celebritydom’

Unfortunately, you can’t live by a different set of rules. Mine had been set already. It comes from a time from the time I was 12 and was a quasi star. A fallen star since nobody remembered me as the same child star who acted in Kalathur Kanamma. So in a way I have experienced being a fallen star. Probably that’s why I `need to know’ things as an important supply of information and as a survival ingredient.

On being Kamal Haasan, on screen

Of course, it happens that a star sometimes overpowers a role. But I try not to do that. One of my biggest success in recent times I would say, in my parameters, is Mahanadi, where you forget the star, where the story overpowered everything else. Another performance I would rate as being important as Mahanadi is Hey Ram. Because in this film, you don’t see the actor. Someone recommended me for an award for the film. But what kind of acting was there? Where is the histrionics? That’s where I see the success of the performance.
Probably I am getting closer to better acting by not making it apparent.

On happiness

Happiness cannot be explained by humour or an ideal situation. Happiness is even realising that you have survived a tragic moment. It is a very funny thing, but people do not have that gratitude for life. They complain. If you are living to complain you have survived that catastrophe. Instead of complaining about Marudanayagam, I have lived now to give an interview on a debacle that could have ruined many careers. That’s the strength of it.

On stardom

Well, I think the same rule about spermatozoa applies here. There are forty million but only one will hit homeground. I was aware of that when I myself was a star struck youngster. So it is a game of heavy chance.
You put in hard work, but still you may fail. There are forty million ways of failing.
Retire

On work and retirement

I have been in cinema since I was a child star, for nearly forty-five years. It is only when I am not able to work comfortably, that perhaps I would retire. Retirement would be due to physical fatigue or failure, rather than of the mind. I am a fan of Kurusowa and a student of Balachander, who is still active. I don’t see why I can’t continue…

It’s a Kamal film!

Yes, unless the director is absolutely full and contributing, it is my film, there are no two ways about it. (I say)if you are a confident director come, take me on. If you are not, then we shall work together.