Rishi Kapoor Birthday: While Rishi Kapoor will always be known for his romantic roles in Hindi cinema, there came a period in the actor’s life when he feared his career was over. The trigger was Karz.
The 1980 film by Subhash Ghai on reincarnation had everything that could make it a blockbuster according to Rishi — great music, an amazing cast and an entirely new kind of story unlike anything seen in other romantic movies at that time. However, when the film failed to meet all the expectations people had from it, the disappointment Rishi felt was much stronger than any others could have expected. In the future, Rishi would tell about that disappointment openly, explaining how badly it affected him emotionally. What made this particular period so hard for him was the fact that he started associating his failures with his marriage to Neetu Kapoor.
Why Did Rishi Kapoor Take Karz’s Failure So Personally?
By the time Karz came out, Rishi Kapoor had already established himself as one of the most popular romantic heroes of Bollywood cinema. He had gained instant popularity with his first film as a hero, Bobby. This initial success also meant high expectations from all his future films. The success of Karz was especially crucial to Rishi.
Unfortunately for him, his film was eclipsed by Feroz Khan’s Qurbani, another film which was coming out at the same time and turning out to be much more successful than Karz. The failure took a toll on Rishi’s confidence level to the point where he started doubting if his days as a hero were over.
Rishi Kapoor Said He Could Barely Face The Camera
The effect was not confined only to disappointment in the box office collections. Later, Rishi wrote that he became so dejected that even working in the film industry and coming to the shooting sets had become difficult for him.
He used to quiver before the camera and even felt faint and used to take shelter in his make-up room. Once, his paranoia about things going wrong on the shooting sets had made it difficult for him to finish the making of the films in progress. The films adversely affected by his absenteeism included Naseeb, Zamaane Ko Dikhana Hai, Deedar-e-Yaar and Prem Rog. It all became so serious that his family thought of taking help from doctors. Raj Kapoor, his father, was deeply worried and even took him out of the usual milieu of film shooting sets.
Why Did Rishi Kapoor Blame Neetu Kapoor?
This is where the crisis for Rishi took on a very personal dimension. After all, Rishi and Neetu Kapoor had just gotten married in January 1980, right around the time Karz hit the theatres. Since the movie did not live up to Rishi’s expectations, he started thinking that perhaps getting married had harmed his romantic appeal.
During this time, things were very different in Bollywood when it came to creating an image for the actors. Rishi was concerned that people would no longer see him in the same light as a romantic hero after he got married. In his autobiography, Rishi later admitted that he actually started feeling that his wife was responsible for the failure of his movies as marriage had somehow robbed him of his appeal and fan base.
Neetu Kapoor Was Pregnant During Rishi’s Breakdown
The timing added to the complexity of the situation since Neetu was carrying their first baby, Riddhima Kapoor Sahni, when Rishi was dealing with such emotional turmoil. In his later recollections, Rishi expressed remorse about the period and about the suffering which Neetu had to bear during her pregnancy.
It is evident from his statements over the years that he realized the injustice done to her. It was not an issue of his marriage but of the tremendous amount of pressure that he had exerted upon himself as a consequence of becoming a star very early in his career and seeing a film he thought good fail to be a huge success.
Qurbani Made The Karz Setback Even Harder
Even though Karz did not turn out to be an utter commercial failure, its success was definitely put into question due to the presence of the blockbuster Qurbani, which only enhanced the feeling of failure. Rishi himself admitted that Qurbani had everything that viewers wanted to see at that particular point in time – big stars, foreign locations, glamour, action, and equally popular songs.
In fact, the time would prove quite forgiving when it comes to Karz since the popularity of some of the songs like “Om Shanti Om”, “Ek Haseena Thi” and “Dard-E-Dil” would continue to grow and even earn the film a certain status of a cult movie. Karz became one of the most recognizable movies that Rishi worked on.
Rishi Kapoor Eventually Rebuilt His Confidence
That low phase certainly didn’t define his entire career. Over time, Rishi slowly got back on track, regained his confidence and continued performing in lead roles for decades. Later, he transformed himself into a character actor and gave some of the best performances in movies like Agneepath, D-Day, Kapoor & Sons, 102 Not Out and Mulk. This new phase in his career, perhaps, demonstrated to the young Rishi himself what his future had always held, but he failed to realize after the movie Karz — he would always remain Bollywood’s romantic hero regardless.
On Rishi Kapoor’s birthday, this episode gives us a unique insight into the confidence and charisma which were synonymous with him on screen. However, the actor eventually admitted the sense of insecurity and depression that he had gone through due to Karz and even misdirected blame in some cases.