Schizophrenic stardom: Dissecting Shah Rukh Khan's 'Fan'

Shah Rukh Khan has always been criticised for playing himself in all his films, no matter what the role. In the recently released Fan, director Maneesh Sharma uses this limitation, and asks him to go ahead and actually play himself. Khan has done this earlier too, in a small cameo in Zoya Akhtar’s Luck By Chance, which was more brutal than Fan in what it said about the film world. “It’s insane”, Khan tells a newly successful Vikram, with the look in his eyes of someone who is not in control of his stardom, but also enjoys it. He then advises Vikram to keep the people who had known him when he was not famous, close to him, because they are the only ones who will tell him the truth. In the next scene, Vikram goes to his ex-girlfriend Sona asking for forgiveness, leading to that remarkable scene where she tells him — “Everything you are saying is only about yourself. Where do I figure in it?” She is saying this not just to him, but also to the person who had given him this advice in the first place.

In Fan, Khan may be called Aryan Khanna, but the film makes connections with his real life to tell you that it is actually him. He is also Gaurav Chandna, a twenty-something Delhi boy obsessed with Aryan, the film star he has grown up idolising. At first glance, the film seems to be about Gaurav. This is what the title tells you, and this is what the credits advertise ( “Shah Rukh Khan in and as fan”). The focus is on Khan’s physical transformation as the much younger Gaurav. But to look for Gaurav’s story here is to be disappointed, for there is none. You feel nothing for him, because he makes you feel nothing for himself. It is easy to think this is because of Khan’s inability to bring any empathy or depth to the character, which it probably is. A better actor would have done something more with the role, irrespective of how it was written.

But because neither he nor the film does this, all our focus shifts to the star instead, and that itself is interesting to watch. For Fan really seems to be about the star, and the hollowness of the world that he lives and thrives in.

Gaurav’s purpose in the story is just that, to lead up to that realisation. It comes to us slowly, lost often in the thriller-ish moments in the film, but by the end, brutally so.

This is a world where Gaurav’s parents casually tell him —  don’t overstay at Aryan’s place — as if he is going to meet a friend. They believe they are a part of the filmi world they watch on screen. Gaurav mimics his idol and performs his songs at his colony function, his ringtone is his song, he has access to his life details possibly through interviews and gossip. This is a whole world in itself, one most of us know quite well, even if not to this degree.

What we don’t know is about the relationship of the star to his own stardom. When his personal assistant asks him what the big deal is in apologizing to Gaurav, especially considering that he seems to be “sanki”, Aryan’s reply is: So what am I? The very next moment, he plasters his face with make-up, and smiles at his reflection in the mirror. It is not a smile, it is the practice of a smile, and is unsettling even when stylised. Aryan is cocky with the British policeman, arrogant with the Indian High commissioner, but is the exact opposite with the powerful businessman whose daughter’s wedding he is dancing at. He doesn’t need to do it for money, but he does it anyway.

In a revealing sequence, when Aryan tells Gaurav that he will not spend even five seconds with him if he doesn’t want to, Gaurav reminds him of his own words: “I am because of my fans”. Gaurav is only demanding the validation of his fandom. Aryan’s stardom, therefore, is not in his control (“Rehne de. Tu nahi samjhega”, Gaurav tells him at two crucial moments). Ironically, Aryan’s stardom also demands this irrationality, it thrives precisely because it is not in his control. He wants it, as the look on his face when no one turns up for his show, tells us.  But in his own way, at his own convenience. Is that why he does not want to apologise? In some twisted way, Gaurav really is part of a schizophrenic reality of Aryan. Gaurav understands this, Aryan doesn’t.

Fan wants us to see Aryan as trapped, and builds enough understanding towards it. We get to know that he got into a brawl with the upcoming film star only because he had flirted with his wife. He stops himself before repeating the dialogue about owing it to his fans again. He tells Gaurav that he should be hard working and make his own life, just like he has done. That he might be a star, but he is also human. But these revelations do not make the person the star is any easier to digest. After all, Gaurav’s entire trajectory and fate are tied to Aryan being too sanki to apologise, to validate what is ultimately a truth about the latter’s existence.  

The final moments of the film are disconcerting as they show the farce that is stardom and the film world. How does Aryan live with himself, after this knowledge? The world he is selling, on the basis of which his stardom and career thrive, does not exist. That this sequence is being played by someone who in real life is deeply entrenched in this system, makes it memorable. Only in Fan, reel life superstar Aryan Khanna seems to know this, he is not deluded by it. In real life, from what we hear about film stars, it seems to be a different story.

The writer is a PhD student at the University of St. Andrews and a freelance writer