Bodyguard to bad guy

The tragedy changed him forever. "I was depressed and sent my kids away to the US to study. I went off to South Africa and did several odd jobs. Commercial television was booming in those days in Cape Town and I used to get several assignments, possibly because of my physique,” he says. It was during this phase that a friend suggested he explore the work possibilities in Muscat. "I went there and got myself a job. Because of some visa formality, I had to leave the country for a few weeks. I decided to visit Mumbai because I had read that it was the world’s largest film-making industry. The idea was to stay for two weeks but that never happened, ” Cristo adds.

"My friend, George Mazputooney, an American, had sold a script to Sanjay Khan and called me over. He introduced me to Khan and we vibed well. After my visa was cleared, I went to Muscat only to return two days later as George had had a massive heart attack and called for me."

“He was to go back to the US and requested me to stay back and see if Khan stuck to the Indianised version of the script. I agreed, even sent him formal reports of the film, Abdullah and never went back only because Khan offered me a role.” And that was when he was bitten by the acting bug.

He reminisces,“Khan needed a mean-looking guy to do the role of Jalad in Abdullah. Since I was on the sets he asked if I would do the role. I readily agreed. The role required me to shave off my head and for 14 years after that I stuck to that bald style." Obviously, that meant having to learn Hindi. Cristo says,“I did not know how to speak Hindi and I remember how Khan would give me my dialogues in the Roman script and I would spend a whole day memorising it. After Abdullah was released sometime in 1980, Khan introduced me to several people in the industry. I got many offers and did films like Hadsa, Qurbani and so on." In those days, Cristo was taken around by Sanjay Khan to meet other producers and to various parties. That is how the title `bodyguard’ came about.

“Khan and I are good friends to date. He used to take me around everywhere and possibly because I was bald and quite heavily built in those days that I looked like someone’s bodyguard. “Actually, Deviyani Chaubal, (film journalist) wrote about Khan acquiring an imported bodyguard and that somehow stuck.” Not that he minds the term very much. For whilst in South Africa, he did actually work as one. “I was employed by Jean Paul Getty’s organisation to accompany his vehicles doing cash transfers. So, being tough comes quite easily to me, ” he says . This toughie has other plans though. After Veer Savarkar, he will get back to managing Sanjay Khan’s resort project in Bangalore where he plans to work as a fitness director. For a villain, who still does 300 push-ups in 25 minutes, guess that’s the way one plans a retirement.