Exclusive | Atlee dissects the success of Shah Rukh Khan’s Jawan, explains how he explored the ‘mass layer’ of the superstar 

Excerpts:

What do you do with so much love that you’ve received for Jawan? Immense love comes with immense responsibility.

It keeps me going and going. As a creator, what is your happiness? The audience’s love, cheering is your happiness. Every time, with every film I can see it (the love) growing, the family is growing and it keeps me moving (ahead). So, yeah, my next one should be much much bigger than this. I don’t know what I am going to do, but as a responsibility is, the takeaway from Jawan response is that I have to do something bigger than Jawan.

As a self-confessed Shah Rukh Khan fan, how did you approach the process of directing him?

I just read the actor before I direct them. So I become their fan and that way I read the fans’ pulse also. If you read Jawan as a thesis, apart from being a film lover, you see how whatever the fans expect from Shah Rukh sir is there in Jawan and whatever he’s not seen doing in the last thirty years is also there. So Jawan is the combination of newness and the minimum ‘guarantee’ of the fans’ pulse. It was very easy for me as a fan to direct the star, it was not that difficult. I have been a fan but I’ve always had the right balance when I was in front of the monitor to direct Khan sir and we are seeing the result. I think more than 90% of the people in the world love Shah Rukh sir and the others who are not, we will bring them in the SRK army with Jawan, I think.

How would you describe SRK as an actor, did you two have creative differences while making the film?

There were no creative differences, there were many creative discussions that happened. Of course, that is a given for every film. Why do we call the process ‘filmmaking’? It’s because we all are making a film, and it should be democratic. Of course we have to listen to everyone, every technician, every star because everyone has put their heart and soul and given their sweat and blood to the film, so you have to hear everything everyone says. Khan sir would often come with his feedback and I came with my feedback, and agreed to some points too. Most of the points though he left it to me, I was very new to him but he said, ‘I’ll do this for the director’. I think we had a very good understanding, we never had disagreements but we had good discussions and that today has turned into good theatrical moments. We both are happy with it.

Did anything about Shah Rukh Khan, the actor, came to you as a surprise. Something that you didn’t think about when you first started discussing the film with him?

He always surprises. He is such a wonderful producer, such a wonderful actor, such a wonderful cinema lover so he is always full of surprises. Just when you think that this step no one will take, he’ll take it. Seriously I learnt a lot from him and continue to keep learning from him.

For instance, Vikram Rathore’s character. He loved Aazad, I love Vikram Rathore in writing, but he trusted me, he gave that one notch extra and that was surprising for me. That has worked with the audience as well. There are moments in the film where the audience has gone like, ‘oh is that him, oh wow! What is this, it is a new aura to us.’ So, the mass layer of Khan sir, I think I explored it in the right vein and that the audience has received this with a lot of love, hooting and cheering.

With Jawan SRK has opened the doors for Bollywood in the south Indian film industries? How are Tamil, or Telugu films now looking at collaborators with Bollywood, not specifically as pan-India films?

Shah Rukh sir did Dil Se so many years back. So this is nothing new for him. But the cinema ecosystem, for the last five-six years, has been very welcoming of each other. Everyone is making a pan-Indian film. In this phase, Shah Rukh sir has been a great visionary by understanding the culture of cinema and what everyone likes all over. So, now he has opened the gate that everyone from every part of the country can collaborate and make a film. He has rebooted the system now. Looking at the success, footfall and ticket sale of Jawan, this is going to help the industry grow bigger and show the global audience what Indian cinema can do.

For the last few years the south Indian and Bollywood film collaborations were being tagged as pan- Indian films. But Jawan was never marketed as a pan-India film, why?

To me, I don’t believe in pan-India films. You make a film for an audience. Was Titanic made only for Hollywood? No writer or director writes for a specific audience. Of course there will be a target audience for what product you make. For us, for Jawan the target audience is the true emotion, it is basic — from 6 years old to 60 years olds. Any film you take, from Avatar to any such film, it is not restricted to a certain zone, it is made for everyone. Every filmmaker, not just me, wants to make a film that makes everyone go gaga over it, love it. So, we also, very precisely, made an Indian film with Indian emotions. Jawan speaks Indian emotions and Indian feelings, it is about us and connects everyone. We were very clear about it, that the film will have elements that join every Indian and it has got its response.

Were you overwhelmed with the overnight national success?

I am very happy and I thank God and the audience, but I feel the same as an individual. I can read the responsibility now. More than taking the success home, I am taking the responsibility home with me. I am now conscious that these many people are going to watch my next film so I have to deliver. They all loved me, so I have to do more. With this I am more confident about how I can make Indian cinema stand globally and make all of us feel proud about it. Without the roots firmly in the ground, you can’t go places, so I know what I have to do, continue my work, make it bigger, take the masses along. I stick to the roots, the basics. In my standards, whatever I can do I’ll do to make India proud of my films. Jawan has added on a greater responsibility, people who didn’t even know my name are loving my film in every part of India, even internationally.

Jawan’s success has opened up Bollywood to you. What is your Bollywood plan now?

I have an Indian plan. I don’t have any zonal plans. I have to make Indian cinema as I have promised to Shah Rukh sir. I will do something bigger than this as my next and everyone will be proud of that. I am thinking in a very national way. Our country is about unity and diversity, and I have to bring the same synergy on a larger scale on a global level.

Is there Jawan 2 on the cards?

Let me sit with a new blank white sheet. I am going to write a lot of love letters to Shah Rukh sir. I don’t know whether it is going to be Jawan or something else. Let me sit with a white paper, close my eyes and figure.