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'Failure teaches you far more than your successes do you.'
'Like they say, success has many fathers and failure is a bastard.'
From buddy drama (Rock On!!, Kai Po Che) to musical romance (Fitoor, Kedarnath) and social dramedy (Chandigarh Kare Aashiqui), Abhishek Kapoor may have a mixed bag of hits and misses with his directorials but his signature voice as storyteller is undeniable in all his outings.
He enters into a different realm with his latest offering Azaad, which has the look and feel of a beautiful storybook. Led by Ajay Devgn, the period action drama also stars two newbies, Rasha Thadani and Aaman Devgan.
"Nobody knows what the audience is going to like. They have access to so much content, so they're becoming more discerning with their choices and their money. Movie-going is not a cheap experience," Kapoor tells Mayur Sanap/Rediff.com.
You wife Pragya Kapoor, who is also the producer on this film, called this her toughest project. What made Azaad so daunting?
That's because of the kind of elements we are dealing with.
You're dealing with animals and you're dealing with newcomers. One of them is enough. So now you have two newcomers and a horse. That in itself should give you an idea of what all needs to be done to mount a film like that.
I can create all this in my head and want to execute it but someone has to deliver it on schedule. Ronnie Screwvala (co-producer) and my wife, they are the people behind me who are doing this.
You don't see them but they are responsible for me to have this playing field for myself.
The soundtrack and score have a big impact in your films. Tell us about the creative process with your music composers.
Every time I make a movie, I dive into a new world.
Every time we all sit, be it with Amitabh (Bhattacharya, lyricist) or Swanand (Kirkire, lyricist), or whoever I am working with, we start from zero.
It is like as if we've never made a movie before.
You just have to be humbled by the fact that you're getting into an arena you know nothing about. Then you start exploring; you explore the music of those times, you go back to the time and see what kind of life was at that time.
At the same time, you have to make it relatable for today's audiences because you're not making it for audiences of that time. So you have to create nostalgia value, at the same time a contemporary relatability to it.
When you're aware of these things and if you're aware of who your audience is going to be, your craft starts to work.
Your last film Chandigarh Kare Aashiqui did not make a great impact. As a film director, what happens when your last film underperforms?
Actually, I don't think it underperformed because the subject matter was such that it was never made for box office success.
Everything cannot just be box office.
Those days were COVID times, so OTT was a dominant player in the market. That subject for those times was correct because the movie had so much penetration in the OTT realm.
I mean, who makes a movie about a transgender woman? It's not even lesbian and gay. It's transgender and they are very, very different from being gay or lesbian. The issues are also very different.
It was something I wanted to do and give back to society because I'm not from that community but I can understand the pain they go through.
Maybe you don't want to answer this, but do you have a least favourite project you have worked on?
No, yaar (Laughs).
The movies I make are like my children, they can be successful or they can be unsuccessful, but you just love them.
In fact, the ones that have not been well are the ones that you root for the most. Because you feel like that's not my strongest child.
Also in life, I've seen enough success and failure. I know that failure teach you far more than your successes do you.
Like they say, success has many fathers and failure is a bastard. You just have to own it up.
So many films later, people still remember you as the man who launched Sushant Singh Rajput's film career. How do you look back at your friendship with him?
It was great.
He was a fantastic actor, incredible individual. So much to offer.
I have still to meet someone more dedicated to his craft than him.
He was like a rocket. You could just shoot him into space or you could use him to drill right into the centre of the earth. He could do both.
Ekta Kapoor is your first cousin. Why haven't we seen you two collaborating on a project?
We love each other very much. Both of us are very strong-headed people; we own our films.
For the sanctity of a relationship, we have avoided working together so far.
We respect each other too much, and are very cautious that if we are going to work together, we should not be ending jeopardising what we share otherwise.
If we ever do work together, we will have to secure our other areas before we get in there.
How's the film-maker in you coping with the times where it has become tougher to pull audiences into theatres?
If anybody says they know, then they really don't know what they're saying, because nobody knows.
Nobody knows what the audience is going to like.
They have access to so much content, so they're becoming more discerning with their choices and their money.
Movie-going is not a cheap experience.
I think it's important to give them something fresh that can enrich their lives. They won't come to see the same stuff again and again.
There's a lot of marketing out there but now, the audience doesn't bite every bit that you throw at them.
