Standing on an Apple Box Read online

  Standing on an

  Apple Box

  The Story of a Girl among the Stars

  AISHWARYAA R. DHANUSH

  FOREWORD BY

  SHWETA BACHCHAN NANDA

  HarperCollins Publishers India

  This book is dedicated to all those celebrity children who manage to retain their sanity and sensibility through it all.

  Contents

  Foreword by Shweta Bachchan Nanda

  1. Standing on an Apple Box

  2. Celebrity Child

  3. My Father, the Superstar

  4. Sacred Ashes

  5. Meditation

  6. The Lord

  7. A Matter of a Thousand

  8. Fathers and Daughters

  9. Lungi & the Louvre

  10. Sisters

  11. Bangalore Days

  12. The Law of Losses

  13. We Take It Black

  14. Festivals

  15. Choices

  16. Radio Ga Ga

  17. Childhood Friends

  18. Pet Peeves

  19. Decoding My Day

  20. A Fan

  21. Madras, Movies and the Maestro

  22. Once Upon a Scandal

  23. Perseverance

  24. The Making of a Marriage

  25. Honeymoon Horrors

  26. Biography of a Mother

  27. More a Son

  28. The Sacred Thread

  29. Weighty Matters

  30. Kiddy Lessons

  31. Tough Love

  32. A Few Hours at the Shooting Spot

  33. A Different Role—Making a Difference

  34. Dance with Me

  35. Looking Ahead

  Acknowledgements

  About the Book

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Foreword

  I first met Aishwaryaa a year ago, when she accompanied her father to a football match, and I had gone with mine. We took our seats behind them as they cheered and clapped their teams on, like excited boys. I could almost read her thoughts. She was thrilled that her father had got an opportunity to let his hair down for a while in the company of a friend and, at least for a couple of hours, the world’s eyes were not trained on him. I know this because I was thinking the very same thing about my father.

  When she called to ask if I would write the foreword to her first book, Aishwaryaa mentioned feeling an affinity to me, as one might with someone who has shared similar life experiences. A few hours later, she very efficiently sent me a rough draft of her book. That evening, as I sat reading, I caught myself smiling at some parts, nodding my head in agreement at others. It was all so relatable. These could have been vignettes from my own life, experiences I had shared with my own father. It’s uncanny how similar our trajectories are. Our fathers have been colleagues and friends for years, our families have always had the highest regard for each other. It’s easy to see why we have so much in common, not just in our public lives but in our private moments as well.

  What the book beautifully brings to life is the story of a regular girl growing up in a not-so-regular home. The story of a mother bringing up her daughters in the gargantuan shadow of their father and being able to bring them up as unspoiled by it as possible. Very often we watch our idols on screen and they take on the superhuman qualities of the characters they portray. What Standing on an Apple Box does is lift the curtain and give you a peek at the men and women behind the makeup and the family units that helped to make them what they are. The stories from Aishwaryaa’s childhood are charming in their simplicity and I couldn’t get enough of the escapades from the life of one of the world’s most recognized men. Though her father is an extraordinary man in every sense of the word, it is the ordinary rituals that he practises in his life, whether for himself or his family, that very clearly are the secrets to his success, as his daughter tells it. Her account of him manages to make a revered icon accessible and, in doing so, she gives hordes of fans the most authentic version of their hero.

  This book is the story of a father and daughter, an icon and his fans, a man and his family. What I like best about it is that it is real, from the heart, and bone honest.

  SHWETA BACHCHAN NANDA

  Standing on an Apple Box

  Movie sets have been a part of my life since I can remember. It is a universe unto itself. Reality does not lose its hold, but becomes twisted. The pace is different, sometimes day is turned into night, summer to rain and your humble, quiet father turns into a rowdy-bashing, dialogue-delivering superstar.

  Once, a girl joined the film industry intent on becoming a cinematographer. (Yes, times have changed; all women do not want to become actresses.) She was talented and hard-working and was soon hired to assist a renowned Director of Photography (DP in movie lingo). On the first day of the shoot, excited and nervous, she approaches her boss, who is busy setting up things.

  ‘Cut that backlight a little more. Hey, you! Get the skimmer on this one. You there! Fix a 2 kv here …’ He glances at her and says softly, ‘You. Baby.’

  She looks around and cannot spot a baby, nor does she recall the script having any baby. Running to one of the many assistant directors, she asks, ‘Is there a baby in this scene? He is asking for the baby!’ The AD, who is enjoying a quiet smoke before the madness began, panics. ‘There is no baby in today’s scene! Oh my god! Is there? Where will we get a baby now!’

  He whips out his phone and the girl decides she has to clarify the matter and walks back, but before she can ask anything, the cameraman points to her. ‘Baby… go… now!’

  She backs away. Is she being dismissed? Did he just call her baby! It’s her first day at work and her boss has just called her baby and asked her to leave. Confusion prevails. Is he being chauvinistic, sleazy, dismissive? She wants to burst into tears but that would just reinforce the usual misogyny.

  Now you must be thinking this girl was being an utter idiot. But remember the aura surrounding movies, remember this is a young girl with stars in her eyes, coming to work for the first time in an industry not exactly known for welcoming women behind the scenes with open arms. It can scramble even a professional’s brains. But by now she is at least sure there is no actual baby involved in the scene.

  The cameraman is getting impatient. He gestures to a more experienced assistant and says, ‘Baby, da…’

  Wow! Tears forgotten, the girl tries to wrap her head around this new scenario. He called the guy baby too.

  The assistant calmly goes over to a bunch of equipment and brings out a large light on a stand and props it near the cameraman, who barks, ‘Finally!’ before getting back to work.

  So a movie set even has a language of its own, from the self-explanatory ‘crane’ to the ‘akela’, the ‘dolly’, the ‘jimmy jib’ and the ‘apple box’.

  Movies are related to glamour, glitz and everything starry, but movie-making is a hectic, draining, unglamorous business. Anybody who has ever been to a movie set knows this. The magic unfolds slowly, painstakingly, and in small bursts of creativity sandwiched between mind-numbing preparations. To start with, I had very little idea about the glamorous side of the business, but I was always thrilled when visiting a set. And I soon discovered that one of the humblest, yet most versatile pieces of equipment used was not the camera, nor the lights, but a small wooden crate-like box called the ‘apple box’. These boxes come in various sizes and are called apple, half apple, quarter apple and pancake, don’t ask me why. I have asked a number of people and come up with nothing. One theory is that they were initially sourced from apple orchards where they were used to store apples. The biggest of them are about 20’x12’x8’ in size. They are used to store
objects to transport to the set, and can be stacked inside each other. So versatile, yet so simple in design!

  Apple boxes are also used to increase the height of the camera stand, to support heavy equipment, to make short actors look tall (many a petite female actor has used it [off frame] to match her fellow actor’s height, and a few male actors too!). They are used to sit on between shots, to serve tea and coffee, to place equipment, to level equipment, as steps, as ladders, and even as tables to work on. Come to any movie shoot and the light man can be heard shouting for it and some assistant director will be scampering around with it.

  When not in use, the other equipment would often turn into playthings for me. The round trolley became a merry-go-round, the crane became a giant wheel. The small crane became a see-saw and I would swing to and fro on the straight trolley. But it was the apple box that accompanied me everywhere.

  The production assistant would place some snacks for me on it. When I watched Appa on the monitor, I would be sitting on an apple box.

  And when one of the most magical moments in my life occurred—I looked through the camera eye and realized instantly and for the first time why movies are magic—I was standing on an apple box.

  Today, when I am at a shooting spot and things are going crazy, as they always do, I take a deep breath, drag an apple box to a corner and sit for a moment. Maybe because I was born into and married into the movie business, an apple box is my idea of comfort. Actors, equipment, methods and genres may come and go, but the apple box stays. I know that as long as there are movies there will be madness, but a simple foot-wide, wooden box is all it takes to give me the courage to find a method in it, to find the magic in it, and hopefully find the courage to create a little of that magic—standing on an apple box.

  Celebrity Child

  One of the most common questions addressed to me is: What is it like being a celebrity child? Even now, when I am anything but a child.

  How different is your life? Do you miss having a normal life? Do you feel lucky/unlucky? Don’t you think that everything comes easily to you?

  And variations of the same.

  When I was young, these questions irritated me. I have had this one life and from my point of view, it’s normal. Later, I understood the curiosity as the nature of my father’s stardom came home to me. The truth was that my father left his stardom and his work at the door when he came into the house. He was our Appa at home, strict when necessary and loving all through. But I learned to answer the questions patiently.

  So, what was it like being a celebrity child?

  I had a pretty normal childhood, so didn’t even realize I was a ‘celebrity child’. As I grew up, I felt blessed most of the time. I know there were a lot of responsibilities attached to the tag and I tried my best to understand and act accordingly. (Very diplomatic and correct, I should point out.)

  How does it feel to have a superstar as a father?

  My father never ever behaves like a superstar at home. For that matter, he doesn’t behave like one anywhere, except in his movies. So it’s like having a normal, loving father who is extra busy but otherwise treats us like his little girls.

  How different is your life?

  It really isn’t very different at all. The same twenty-four hours during which we eat, sleep, watch lots of movies, argue, laugh, cry, party, sleep and, of course, work and worry, just the same as everybody else. The only difference being that when we do it, people notice. Particularly in the last decade or so.

  Do you have it easy?

  Not at all. Everything I do is filtered through the lens of my father’s immense talent and success (and now, of course, my husband’s). If any doors open, they may have hidden agendas concealed behind them. And believe me when I tell you that unless you have talent, you cannot succeed, no matter who your family is. The first step may be paved, but the rest of the way to any achievement rests solely on your shoulders, and these shoulders carry the extra burden of being compared to two extremely accomplished individuals I am related to by blood and by marriage. The one who gave life to me, and the one I share my life with.

  Did you miss out on a normal childhood?

  Fortunately not. Most of the credit goes to Amma for having brought us up without any visible signs of my father’s stardom. And to Appa, of course, for being the humble person he is, never hinting at his stardom. We never travelled in, or owned, fancy cars (Appa still doesn’t). No fancy bags or clothes. We shopped like everyone else in the local showrooms of Madras (now Chennai) and Bangalore. Like any middle-class child of my age, I was unaware of the concept of pocket money and never had any, except the little amounts we were given on festivals and other special occasions. We did frequent restaurants a lot, but were never bothered by anyone. Nobody recognized us (thanks to my father’s policy of never releasing any photographs of the family), so we went on the usual temple and beach trips pretty often. We played at Marina beach almost every second day and visited the temples at Adayar and Santhome every week. Food would be packed and brought from home and we would sit in the temple halls, eating and watching people walk by (a common Madras pastime). Amma would sometimes let us eat out and we would walk into the small eateries around the temples and beaches and stuff our faces. There was no Internet and no cell phones for people to click snaps with or take videos, else photos of my gluttony would have kept the world wide web entertained for a long time. Nobody stared, or cared, and we went about our business of growing up, just like all our friends did. Even during any functions that involved Appa, we would sit a few rows behind with trusted uncles, aunts and cousins. Amma did this so that we did not appear in the flurry of photographs inevitably taken of Appa and everyone around him. Most of the other stars sent their children abroad to study and stay out of the public eye. My parents did not want to let us go, so other safeguards were put in place to ensure we had a normal childhood.

  I went for summer vacations to Bangalore and stayed at my maternal grandparents’ place. We did have lovely birthday parties, but nothing extravagant. We went for movies, ate chaat at Gangotree, binged on junk food at every outing, played checkers late into the night, and that was the extent of the indulgences that came our way.

  One incident does come to mind that shows how clueless we were. (And how patient Appa often is.)

  Polio was a cause that my father supported and he had done a public service announcement for the same. It was all over television and radio. Many people tried to find some hidden meaning in his support, and coupled with the fact that we were kept away from the public eye, decided that my sister or I had some ‘physical issues’, maybe even polio.

  During this time, one of my father’s friends visited with a few friends of his. They were Appa’s admirers. One of them, a lady, seemed super excited. Tea and snacks were served and photos taken. We were at home and were called in to say hello to the guests. Most of you would have gone through this: Paraded in front of guests and made to show off what you had learned in school or dance class. Once the ‘hello uncle, hello aunty…’ were over, the lady asked us to sing a song for them. It wasn’t out of the ordinary, so we went ahead and sang some default song that we had been taught at school. Usually after this the adults would get back to their tea and gossip while we filed away to our rooms. But this time the lady applauded and urged us on to sing some more and then she said, ‘Now why don’t you dance like your father?’ Like any kids of that age, we were not immune to being the centre of attention, so we clumsily tried to copy some dance steps we had seen in the movies, completely out of sync but enjoying ourselves. The lady clapped and smiled sweetly, even got up to look closer at us. All the other adults were smiling and we thought we were doing something extraordinary.

  It was only later that Appa remarked on what she was really doing. This very pleasant lady had heard the rumours and was checking if they were true. Trying to find out if we had problems talking, walking, etc. Every time we did something, she couldn’t hide her surprise and her extreme
curiosity pushed her into asking us to do something different. This went on for about half an hour. As kids we were pretty oblivious and thought she was genuinely enjoying our performance. What she really wanted to find out was why Rajinikanth kept his kids hidden away.

  As a mother I perfectly understand Appa’s reasons for keeping us out of the limelight. And if that lady is anything to go by, he protected us from a lot of heartache. We were able to indulge in the small pleasures that make childhood special, without worrying about the outside world. The situation is diametrically different today. Some of the gossip is so wild, the technology so fast and seamless, I am sure that the polio rumour would have ended in photoshopped images, wild theories and emotional scarring for us. I imagine (I am going to extremes but bear with me, things like this happen) it would have forced my father to release some family photos, and our anonymity, together with our freedom and childhood innocence, would have taken a beating. I am thankful he did not do that or, rather, that his hand was not forced.

  Celebrity kids are under so much pressure, it is more surprising when they turn out well than when they don’t. I must say I am very impressed with the younger lot that came after me. My kids have the double burden of having famous parents and grandparents. I try my best to shield them at this young age, but I must admit it is difficult. What most people don’t understand in their urge to find out more is that celebrity kids are kids too. Too much attention, too much exposure and too much magnifying of their actions can spell disaster. An entire industry revolves around this, and we can see the horrible effects on many famous adults who were exposed to the media incessantly since their childhood, especially in the West.

  It’s wishful thinking on my part, but I wish society would leave these kids alone and not stunt their childhood. Living in Chennai (which is particular about privacy and manners) helps and being vigilant to the point of paranoia, I have even taught my boys to turn their faces away when a stranger photographs them. And I rue the fact that it’s not so easy for them to step out for a simple walk to the end of the road for an ice cream or experience the unadulterated joy of running amok in the sands and among the colourful stalls of Marina beach. It’s a pleasure that should not be denied to any child living in this city.