outside world, captured it in his memory and stilled it as a picture on the stage, he added. And, this was the job of a director and actor, he added. To a question, he said a good movie to him was the one which communicated easily with the audience and managed to capture the spirit of the time. Shah termed “Sholay” not a good movie and said that ‘Piyasa’, ‘Guide’, ‘Masoom’, Teesri Manzil’ Mughal-e-Azam’, ‘Libaas’, ‘Ijazat’ etc., were good movies to him. He said ‘Sholay did not comer up to the above mentioned two standards.
He told the audience that a failed actor would be one who would give up hope. He said he always advised the youngsters not to join the acting profession if they did not feel that they would die if they did not act.
To another question about signing popular movies, he said once a fan of him asked him the same question and “I asked him few names of my art movies but he had not watched any of them. When, he asked about the movies like “Chamatkar’ and ‘Oye Oye’, the fan nodded his head in affirmative. On which, he told him that that was the reason he had signed popular movies too, he added.
About his movie “Mirza Ghalib”, he said he felt lucky and proud on doing that movie. He said when he was a child, he heard about Ghalib for the first time when passed through a street on a tanga and everyone would point out to a house saying it was the house of Mirza Ghalib, but then that had been converted into a coal shop. Since then, he kept on listening about Ghalib at different stages of life and he learnt more about Ghalib when he grew up.
When he heard Gulzar Sahib doing a movie on Ghalib and signing Sanjeev Kumar as hero, he wrote a letter to Gulzar Sahib and requested him to take him as hero giving very odd reasons. Gulzar did not receive that letter but ‘fortunately or unfortunately’ Sanjeev Kumar fell ill and Gulzar had to delay the movie. He said he was lucky in a sense that he was the least favourite for the movie but due to various reasons Gulzar had to sign him as the hero.
Naseeruddin claims that the script of Mirza Ghalib was the reason behind its success. If any other actor had played the role, even then the movie would have been a success, he added. His role in such a great movie was just because of luck, he added.
Naseeruddin said it was the work of the actor that mattered regarding audience. A good actor could turn a bad audience into a good audience and vice versa.
Choosing between theatre and film, he said even held at gunpoint to choose between theatre and film, he would choose theatre. Because, only theatre was the medium where energies are exchanged and communicated takes place directly with the audience. In film, the actor communicates with the camera that was not a human being.