A tale of two Gandhis

Writer-director Feroz Abbas Khan has stepped out of his comfort zone - the theatre - to bring the story of Mahatma Gandhi's prodigal son to the big screen.

Even as Feroz Abbas Khan professes his undying love for theatre ("I could die breathing theatre"), his debut film Gandhi, My Father is fetching a mixed bag of reactions from its audience "" reactions that he himself is trying to interpret. Just like the troubled relationship between a father and a son that he's tried doing justice to "" a tale as poignant and yet passionate in its own way.

But then, that's the passion only a play can command. Only, this time it is screenplay and not theatre play. And coming from someone who has been living theatre for the last two decades, it brings with it a certain degree of authenticity.

"It's a subject that I wanted to explore the most. And the journey has been a great success," he says, brushing aside the charge of the film being an adaptation of his theatrical work Mahatma Vs Gandhi. And by the journey he means resurrecting Gandhi as seen and felt by his family and yet not detached from the image that the masses so revered.

"Let me put this straight. In the first place, I never wanted to direct a film. But then, having being closely associated with theatre, I also realised that somewhere I did restrict my audience. Call it one of the limitations of theatre but they exist and it can't be denied that film as a mass medium has a huge reach," says Khan.

Khan is not new to criticism "" but it is critical acclaim that he seeks. For someone who has been at the forefront of the modern theatre movement, 48-year-old Khan carries with him the reputation of a thinking director.

For someone who was professionally trained to eke out a living in finance (Khan studied chartered accountancy and even headed a corporate company in keeping with the profile!), theatre has been more of a passion than profession.

"Though I took to theatre in 1980, it was only after I got associated with Prithvi Theatre that my journey acquired a meaning," says Khan. Khan was associated with Prithvi from 1983 to 1992. From acting to production (Khan won the All India Best Actor Award in his early years), Khan has enjoyed every nuance of theatre.

In fact, it is to his credit that Prithvi Theatre started its international festival and he later went on to become the first artistic director of the group. "After Jennifer Kapoor, I've yet to come across someone with more passion for theatre," he says.

It was in 1992 that Khan decided to begin an independent journey. He experimented and explored new forms to claim mainstream attention for Hindi theatre. "Looking back, it's been an extremely satisfying and challenging journey, of having worked with the finest talent from theatre and cinema, and on topics [that are] as diverse," he says.

By the finest talent, he means Farook Shaikh and Shabana Azmi (Tumahari Amrita) and Anupam Kher and Kirron Kher (Salgirah), to name a few. Of his other productions, he is very proud of his adaptation of Peter Shaffer's epic play The Royal Hunt of The Sun and the recent contemporary Indian adaptation of Arthur Miller's classic Death of a Salesman "" both considered landmark events in Indian theatre.

Coming back to Gandhi, My Father, the film explores the troubled relationship between the father and son in a manner that is objective, which is what made it difficult. "It would have been far simpler to project one as a hero and the other as a villain. Only, that is never the case," he says.

This is where the film scores. While Akshaye Khanna as Harilal Gandhi attracts pity for being at odds with his confused identity and rebellion, Darshan Jariwala as Mahatma Gandhi looks not only convincing as Gandhi but also much more human. The film does get theatrical in places, though Khan does not think so.

"Let us not define what cinema is," he comes out strongly. "What you call theatrical is what I call style. I have used a certain style to enhance the experience. It definitely does not mean that I come with a baggage of theatre," he says.

Here, he is obviously referring to the clip where Harilal lashes out in angst as part of of a street theatre troupe enacting Mahabharata. "The drama was created to accentuate the denial of a son," he says, "and proved to be very effective".

But the most difficult scene according to Khan was the conversion of Harilal. "Though it's a known fact that Harilal had converted to Islam, it was by far the most sensitive scene. For one, this was something you cannot do anything without understanding the socio-economical function. And here, we were shooting in Ahmedabad and the last thing we wanted was to sensationalise it. All we wanted was to state the truth," he says.

But then, this is what the movie is meant to be: a statement of true events. Though the film was shot over 100 days, research took a long time, as did post production.

For his source, Khan has stuck to two books "" Harilal Gandhi: A Life, Harilal's biography by Chandulal Bhagubhai Dalal, and Gandhiji's Lost Jewel: Harilal Gandhi by Harilal's grand-daughter, Neelamben Parikh.

For characters, Khan chose Jariwala as Gandhi for his strong affiliation with Gujarati theatre. "Darshan is one of the most brilliant theatre actors in Gujarati, and being a Gujarati himself, he knows the culture, background and has the body language required for the character," he says. As for Shefali Shah as

Kasturba, she was there in his mind "right from the beginning", he says.

But what about the rumoured brush with the censors? "There was none," he says. "They just loved the piece. In fact, they were so moved that there were tears in their eyes. The film was passed without a cut," he adds. Now it's up to the audiences to react to the tale of the two Gandhis.