30 years of Rangeela: Ram Gopal Varma on not working with AR Rahman after Rangeela and Daud, “You need a lot of patience to work with him”
Ram Gopal Varma’s iconic Rangeela completes 30 years today. Starring Aamir Khan, Urmila Matondkar and Jackie Shroff, the light-hearted film continues to win the audience’s hearts. The filmmaker looked back at the film in an interview with us.
After all those dark films, how did you think of this light-hearted Cinderella story?
There’s no such thing as dark and light kind of films in my repertoire. Even the dark films have songs romance and light moments. I am definitely more attracted to films that deal with power conflicts. But every director keeps remaking his favourite films. Mine are The Godfather, MacKenna’s Gold, The Exorcist, The Sound Of Music and Singing In The Rain.
Rangeela is your Singing In The Rain?
I came to Rangeela after making a couple of dark films Shiva and Raat. But before Rangeela, I also made two very frothy Telugu films Govinda Govinda and Kshana Kshanam. So, it wasn’t as if I suddenly swerved into the romantic musical genre. To me, Rangeela was a homage to two of my favourite Hollywood films, The Sound Of Music and Singing In The Rain. The choreography was inspired by Singing In The Rain.
There are no negative characters
The Sound Of Music was the first film I had seen which had no antagonist. I consciously avoided negative characters in Rangeela.
The chawl where the protagonist lived looked real
It was set in very real situations. We shot in a real middleclass house to show Urmila and her family’s lifestyle.
Rangeela made Urmila a star
When people say I made Urmila’s career in Rangeela, I completely disagree. I am the same guy who earlier made Drohi with Urmila. What happened to that? For any actor, success is a question of getting the right opportunity. Then everything falls into place.
How did you zero in on Urmila?
During Drohi, the choreographer didn’t turn up for a song. So, I asked Urmila if she would dance on her own and she agreed. And she did a great job. That’s when I decided to make Rangeela with Urmila.
I think Aamir Khan stole the show
Aamir’s character was based on a street goonda I knew in Hyderabad. When I narrated Rangeela to Aamir he immediately agreed. He is an incredibly passionate performer.
Was Steven Kapur based on Shekhar Kapoor?
I heard Shekhar and Vinod Chopra argued whether it was the one or the other. When they asked me, I told them to keep guessing.
You never worked with A R Rahman after Rangeela
You need a lot of patience to work with him. He works at his own pace. I like doing things yesterday. He likes doing them day after tomorrow. I didn’t have the patience. So, after Rangeela and Daud, we never worked together again. Rangeela worked. Daud didn’t. There’s no way we can predict these things. I’d like to do another film in the Rangeela genre.
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