Opinion The cross-generational charm of Shah Rukh Khan

However, Shah Rukh’s comeback is an even bigger deal for his fans, especially those like me in our mid-20s who may or may not have had an existential crisis triggered by the thought that not only were our favourite actor’s best days behind him but also that we would simply never get to experience them as we wanted to.

Fandoms are a hard thing to decipher. If one doesn’t like a certain actor, musician, etc., it’s almost impossible to see what their fans see. It’s purely emotional after a point, which makes the community bonding of fandoms, as well as the parasocial relationship with the “star”, unique, different from other kinships.

What makes Shah Rukh Khan so special to people across generations has already been the subject matter of some non-fiction books. For example, Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh (2021) by Shrayana Bhattacharya, takes a look at women’s autonomy, economic mobility and social progress through the lens of the ever-inclusive SRK fandom. The personal anecdotes in the book made me feel connected to countless women out there — women of all ages, religions, and economic classes who had sought refuge in his famous pose, with his arms spread wide, daring to believe that “agar kisi cheez ko dil se chaho, toh poori kainaat usey tumse milaane ki koshish mein lag jaati hai” (if you desire something with your whole heart, the entire universe works to try and bring it to you).

But why Shah Rukh? What makes him so different from his contemporaries (and even those who came after him) that even now, at a time when Bollywood seems to be giving more misses than hits, his is still the charm that works? Why are people flocking to see this 57-year-old at 6 am, in a genre he has only occasionally dabbled in throughout his 31-year-long career, often to mixed results? What is prompting people to write essays and Twitter threads about why Shah Rukh Khan is the “only thing that can unite the nation now”?

I would say it’s because of how real he seems even in the most exaggerated, larger-than-life characters. There is an earnestness in every great performance, an openness to being vulnerable, that makes the actor rise above even in the “massiest” of films. For women, especially, that vulnerability is probably the biggest factor in the cross-generation appeal of SRK.

And for my generation, which expresses its emotions best through memes, the one about Shah Rukh ruining your love life because he set your expectations too high, has an element of truth to it, like all great jokes do. Raj attempting to woo Simran’s entire family in Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995) and Aman putting his feelings for Naina aside to make sure she has a happy life ahead of her in Kal Ho Naa Ho (2003) are cited as examples to prove Shah Rukh is the “king of romance”. But for me, his ability to look at a heroine and conjure up a love story better than what the script has in store will always take my breath away. Case in point, his chemistry with both Nayanthara and Deepika Padukone in Jawan.

Shah Rukh’s offscreen personality has also won hearts over the years. Hundreds of fans, journalists and colleagues have recounted how humble, warm, and witty he is in real life. Recently, Bhutanese actor Sangay Tsheltrim, his co-star in Jawan, talked about how Shah Rukh “thanked him” for agreeing to be a part of the film. At the same time, so many of his interviews are a delight to revisit, only because of his candid responses — he never pretends to be shy about his achievements, instead reeling off lines like “I just assume everyone wants to work with me” in his inimitable style.

There is a darker side to SRK’s story too. In Nasreen Munni Kabir’s documentary The Inner and Outer World of Shah Rukh Khan (2005), he talks about his struggle with depression, and how the loss of his parents and caring for his elder sister, who also struggled with depression, forced him to grow up in a matter of months. Hearing him talk about his mental health issues was a revelation for me as a teenager — that was the first time I had heard a celebrity — a man, at that — open up about his struggles with depression. Even today, when there is so much more sensitivity to these issues, celebrities who open up about their struggles with mental health get trolled on social media; for an Indian man to do this at the height of his fame was something that could only have happened in fiction.

But that’s what Brand SRK has been selling all this while: The power of stories and what happens when you believe in them enough. How does one not become and stay a fan?

arushi.bhaskar@indianexpress.com