Sanju shows how a biopic should be cast

By Rajiv Vijayakar -

June 27, 2018 - 11:16 AM IST

If you are flummoxed, impressed or amazed by how Ranbir Kapoor looks so much like Sanjay Dutt in the biopic Sanju, then this one is especially for you. Such an impeccable, almost visionary casting does not come by luck alone. Most of it is hard work, a little bit of prosthetics and finally top priorities given due importance. And all these aspects come up after deep thought and brainstorming.

Sanju shows how a biopic should be cast

Rajkumar Hirani, who directed and co-produced the film, explains, “My writer Abhijat Joshi and I have a rule: we do not cast anyone until the script is complete. That can limit our writing because we start thinking about an actor’s strengths and weaknesses.”

And why, after the first draft was done, did he think of Ranbir Kapoor for the role? “We are beginning the story around the 1980s when Sanjay Dutt went for the first time into drugs and was also shooting for Rocky. I noticed that there was a lot of similarity between his look then and Ranbir’s look in Saawariya. Both were lean, had about the same height and there was some match in the looks.”

The battle did not end there, however. Sanjay Dutt built his physique to another level in the 1990s and so there was a challenge in how Ranbir would match him in the later sequences. Says Hirani, “For this, Ranbir put in a lot of effort. We had look tests, used prosthetics and spent three months and at least 5 hours daily working on various looks. Ranbir copied his walk, using shoes one size larger like Sanjay does, and practiced everything. Hair tends to thin with age, and Ranbir used a bald wig on his hair, on which another wig was put. As per the age of Sanjay that we were showing, these wigs had different hair—first thick and then thinning. Ranbir also got minute details from Sanjay and even helped himself psychologically by using the same perfume!”

Hirani smilingly recollects how everyone was cynical about Ranbir playing the star till they saw the poster and teaser, which shocked all in a pleasant way. When Ranbir as Sanjay replaced him in the Rocky posters in the film, it was almost an unnoticeable switch. And watching the teaser, Rishi Kapoor was moved to tears.

Dutt’s different

Hirani notes the axiom that when a protagonist is known, it is a must for the actor to have a physical resemblance. We have seen this in the past when Sachin Khedekar played Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, or Paresh Rawal essayed Sardar in the biopic on Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. If it is an unknown person, we can get someone who looks totally different, he maintains. But he had to break that rule in casting an actor for Sunil Dutt’s character.

“How do we make an actor look old? Through thinning hair, grey hair and beard,” Hirani points out. “But Sunil Dutt had black hair and no standout mannerisms throughout. We did try out some actors, but in view of the role, we finally decided that we needed a fantastic actor in his role who could get the emotions right. And Paresh won us over in our first reading of the script!”

With some smart makeup and camerawork, Manisha Koirala as Nargis had a better resemblance. Said Manisha, “Baba (Sanjay Dutt) complimented me by saying I resembled his mother in the photographs of Sanju.”

Similarly, there is a kind of organic similarity in Diljit Dosanjh playing ace hockey player Sandeep Singh in Soorma. And speaking of Sikhs, one of the most successful biopics in recent times was when Farhan Akhtar went all out to bring alive Milkha Singh in Bhaag Milkha Bhaag. The process involved immense physical effort.

Farhan states, “But for me, the mental prep was more stressful. I had to imagine a past, and it was a point-to-point process! It was all about believing, rather than calculating, on a daily basis. My family members understood all my moods. My friends took some time though because, for 18 months, my lifestyle was different – no late nights for one! But it was all worth it because of the great response. That does not happen all the time to any actor!”

Keeping it smart

And so, as we see, it is axiomatic that in the final analysis, the emphasis has to be primarily on acting proficiency, because physical similarities, other than those acquired by working out or losing weight, are not always possible.

Recalled Priyanka Chopra about Mary Kom, on the short Manipuri athlete she essayed so well, “When I met Mary, she accepted and encouraged me when I had self-doubts about depicting her persona and the Manipuri culture in a proper fashion. She gave me the responsibility of conveying her emotions and showing her spirit. I have stirred and swallowed the essence of Mary—maybe other actresses might have done it too, but I have pride in bringing her alive on screen. Of course, Mary says that no one could have essayed her better than me!”

On the complete physical dissimilarity, Priyanka reasoned, “The scale of a motion picture needed to do justice to Mary’s life could not have been matched by a new face. How many of the commercially top actresses today have a North-Eastern face? Look, plainly put, I needed to show her spirit, not her face!”

The smash success of Aamir Khan’s Dangal (the biopic on Haryanvi wrestler Mahavir Phogat and his daughters Geeta and Babita) and even the recent extraordinary faring of Raazi, in which Alia Bhatt played Sehmat, are two more such illustrations of star-power compensating for a lack of physical similarity. Another prominent example was of Sushant Singh Rajput in M.S. Dhoni: The Untold Story.

Then there are times when a story just details one or two life-changing episodes in a person’s life that made them what they were, and here is where a liberal license can be taken with the physical resemblance. Sonam Kapoor as Neerja or Aishwarya Rai Bachchan in Sarbjit were two such examples.

Or then, a biopic can be “disguised” and so the question of a resemblance does not arise at all. Akshay Kumar, with minor changes in hair and moustache in Airlift, Rustom, Pad-Man and the forthcoming Gold are examples. And the life of three real Income-Tax officers (not just one, as claimed) came alive through the character of Ajay Devgn in Raid.

The die of a biopic is thus cast with the right cast!