10 years of Cheeni Kum: Amitabh Bachchan says Zohra Sehgal was a rocket on take-off

Amitabh Bachchan and Zohra Sehgal worked together for the first time in the film Cheeni Kum. As the film completes 10 years today, Bachchan recalls the time he spent with Zohra, who died in 2014. “I worked with Zohraji for the first time in the film, though the association with her goes back to my parents’ time and Prithvi Theatres,” says Bachchan in an e-mail interview with us, adding that finally “working with Zohraji was an absolute honour for me”.

In the film, Bachchan, then 64 years old, played a man his exactly his own age (who fell in love with a 34-year-old woman, a character played by Tabu), and Zohra, then 95, played his mother.

There were also rumours that Zohra asked for a glass of whiskey from the film’s director, R. Balki, after every shot. However, after the shooting for the film was over, Bachchan also gifted her an entire crate of champagne. “Zohraji was a rocket on take-off, each day of the shoot. Her energy and joie de vivre (joy of living) were unmatchable. I cannot remember her asking for a whiskey after each shot from Balki, but yes, she did enjoy her champagne and because she had expressed a desire to be given some after the film was over, I did send across the ‘bubbly’ to her,” he adds.

Bachchan reveals that he said “yes” to the film because R. Balki was directing it. (Incidentally, Balki later also directed Bachchan in Paa, in which he played a boy suffering from a rare disease called progeria.) “It was the director R. Balki that made me say yes to the film. Having worked with him on various endorsement campaigns, when he asked me [to work in the film], I agreed. The script and the character came after I had already said yes,” he says.

While Cheeni Kum was a box-office hit, Bachchan says that he does not like to evaluate a film’s commercial success. “While making a film, I do not evaluate or anticipate its fate at the box office,” he says. “During its shoot, a film needs the attention and attitude of the actor and the director. Once that is done, it is left to the fate of the box office window.”