Salman Khan: The common man’s superstar

Back in the 1990s, Salman Khan captured the attention of starry-eyed teenagers and front benchers with his muscular, good looks and charming intensity. Two decades later, Salman is still greeted with wolf whistles and catcalls every time he struts about on screen, shrugs off his shirt or breaks into a jig.

Last week, he swaggered on to the silver screen as the swashbuckling Chulbul Pandey, doing what he does best — beating up the baddies, swinging his hips and wooing the woman of his dreams. Cash registers haven’t stopped ringing ever since Dabangg’s release, all thanks to the star who plays the enigmatic bad-boy-with-a-heart-of-gold with ease.

And while director Abhinav Kashyap claims that he had to rewrite the role several times to get Salman’s body language and mannerisms incorporated, the actor insists that he was not playing himself on screen. “I am nothing like the characters I portray in my films,” he says.

Industry observers, film critics, fans and friends agree that Chulbul Pandey works because he has many shades — he is romantic, emotional, comic and masculine, a self-deprecating and over-the-top portrayal of Salman himself. “He plays the cheeky Chulbul to perfection. Its Salman’s best performance till date,” says actor Aamir Khan.

However, despite his undeniable star power, box office clout, and the exclusive membership to the Khan trinity (Aamir-Salman-Shah Rukh) club, the actor has always been the ‘hero of the masses’ with the ‘thinking’ moviegoers often dismissing him as loud and over-hyped.

Salman has also come under criticism for his off-screen reputation as ‘Bollywood’s brat’, a tag that the actor seems uncomfortable with. “I am a regular guy, trying to live my life as best I can,” he says. His knack of walking into trouble may have affected people’s opinion of him as an actor, but those who know him claim that he has a heart of gold. “He is mercurial and often misunderstood but he is a great human being and will never hurt anyone intentionally,” says father Salim Khan.

Surprisingly, Salman’s controversial personal life and run-ins with the law have never affected his box-office pull.  The actor continues to deliver hit after hit in spite of his public misdemeanors. “Over the years, Salman has emerged as the unpredictable superstar by delivering unrivaled box office successes at regular intervals,” says filmmaker David Dhawan.

Adds film exhibitor Manoj Desai, “With a Salman Khan film, the question is not whether it will be a hit, but how big a hit.”
Gossip magazines are full of juicy tidbits from his personal life, a drunken brawl here, a rocky affair there. More recently, he received flak for his controversial statements on the Mumbai terror attacks. But Salman continues to remain unfazed and untouched, thanks to the goodwill he commands within and outside the film industry.

“The Salman I know is God’s good man who may do or say something politically incorrect once in a while. But he is a gem of a person,” says actor-turned-politician Shatrughan Sinha whose daughter, Sonakshi, made her debut opposite Salman in Dabangg.

The enigmatic Khan has seen it all — box office success and failure as well as fame and notoriety. “His flaws make him human and more appealing unlike the intelligent Aamir or the articulate Shah Rukh with whom the man on the streets cannot relate to,” says cloth merchant Anish Sharma.

School teacher Suhana Vashist feels that the actor has two sides, just like all of us. “He is a man of contrasts — a rash driver who ran over people, a generous star who runs a charity, a domineering and overbearing lover and a caring and protective brother and son.” Another fan, Ramesh Dighe, says that Salman’s darker side represents the complexity of the times we live in and the positive one reinforces the belief in the innate goodness of all human beings.

Meanwhile, his latest film is setting new benchmarks and winning over more fans from the other side. Fans and critics are raving about Salman’s “old-fashioned masculinity” that has been combined with kitschy mass appeal. “Dabangg’s popularity has cut across the class divide and even those who are not hardcore Salman loyalists are flocking to theatres,” says trade analyst Komal Nahta, referring to box office collections at the multiplexes.

So, why the sudden interest in the shirtless wonder of Bollywood, who gets written off every time he slips in real life but seems to bounce right back?  Like everything else about Salman, his resilience and mass appeal is hard to explain. “He is a great human being, a complete entertainer and his films portray his larger-than-life personality,” says friend and colleague, Govinda.
In an industry where Aamir is perceived as the perfect actor and marketing guru and Shah Rukh as the media savvy businessman, Salman remains the quintessential Bollywood hero who gets to beat up the goons, mouth cheesy dialogues and show off his well-toned body.