‘Our hearts do get broken,’ says Karan Johar as he speaks about mental health, completing 25 years in Bollywood and more

Karan Johar's 10th directorial venture, Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahani, hit the screens on July 28 and in three weeks has amassed INR 300 crore globally. 2023 also marks 25 years since he made his directorial debut with Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (1998). We thought it was time to catch up with him for some gupshup on the twin achievements.

Excerpts from our conversation…

Success is nothing new to you. What makes this one so special?

I was at my most vulnerable before the release of Rocky Rani. This film came after seven years, and in these seven years, my personal journey has been full of kabhi khushi kabhi gham. Specifically, the last three years have been tough for me. The pandemic wasn’t kind to the world, but it also wasn’t kind to our industry in various ways. I went through a lot of personal anxiety, which I held back and (it) festered. It all somehow came out in terms of anxiety and stress, right before the release. I felt that for the first time, I was seeking validation. A quintessential filmmaker, coming from a space of conviction, should never seek validation from anyone but himself or herself. But I really felt like I needed it. I felt like if I didn’t get it, it would have dropped me many notches down (in terms of) my morale, as a human being, for myself, for my company. I built this up in my head to such a large extent that the success of this film and the love received for this film feels like, in many ways, my biggest victory. I had a moment in my house when I just sat alone and cried. My tears were tears of joy, but also tears of relief. In many ways, it was like, ‘okay, I can breathe’.

Also read: Karan Johar, Malaika Arora attend star-studded get-together hosted by Kareena Kapoor [PICS]

You have had so many baiters. Did you anticipate that even they’d warm up to the film?

 I’m shocked! I was not expecting this kind of critical love. For the first time, I felt like I was not pandering to anybody. Even when I did the Kashmir love song, or I did the homage to (Sanjay Leela) Bhansali. Everything in Rocky Rani is organically coming from my love for Hindi and Indian cinema. I somehow don’t think that I’ve received critical acclaim, and I feel sometimes my reputation precedes me, in not such a good way. I feel people enter a film of mine with a kind of bias. Critics haven’t always given me that kind of unanimous love. When it started coming my way, Friday onwards, I went a little numb. I don’t expect Anurag Kashyap to see my film twice, I don’t expect Konkana (Sen Sharma) to send me the most beautiful message that she did. These are just a few names, there are many more, people who I know don’t react to the syntax of mainstream cinema. But they reacted to this film, and I was really blown away with the love.

You have been bullied, continue to be bullied. With this film, it felt like you were taking the mickey out of a lot of things, in a good-humoured way…

The film has hidden rebellion. Possibly you’ve observed it and noticed it. Not many may have, but for the first time, I felt, in my representation of content, that I had a certain kind of latent anger within me that was coming out through the characters. Many of the characters in the film are very personal to me. When Chandon speaks about how he was humiliated by his peers and his friends, and they made fun of him, and they laughed at him, it went back into my own childhood because as a child, I would love to dance, and my father was proud of that. But kids, my age laughed at the way I danced because I was effeminate, and it was not like how the other boys were, and tell so many stories, you never get tired because each story is different from the other.

I want Dharma Productions to grow in terms of its infrastructure. I’d love to have my own post-production studio, my own music company, my own special effects, CGI division. I have so much in my head that I want to do. I feel I’m just getting started. I feel like the vision was not there earlier because I was trying to first mount the company into a zone of stability. I feel like my dreams will be realised from now onwards, like up to this point, my dream was just to solidify our company and make us have that dream of expansion. Now, I feel like we’re at that stage where we can dream further. 

I grew up with a feeling that I wasn’t like the others. Thankfully, I had very supportive parents, they never let me feel that I was any different. When Ranveer does Dola re Dola, it really felt like redemption for me in many ways. Even Rani’s character. What she stands for, the anger that she comes on with. You know we are people of privilege, and we should never, ever deny that. But it doesn’t mean that our hearts don’t get broken. It doesn’t mean that we don’t go through severe bouts of depression and anxiety. Our mental health can really drain us. We all seek assistance and help from professionals. I needed the help because when I was facing the world, I had to still be strong because resilience is everything. The latent anger that I felt runs through the DNA of the film as well.

Coming back to the film, the old films within and the Hindi songs, how you have narratively integrated them. It’s a strain in a lot of your films…

It just came very naturally to me. I’ve grown up hearing only Hindi film music and Indian music. My mother used to put on the radio when I was a child and used to like, you know, hear all the classic songs of Lataji and Rafi saab and Ashaji, and Kishore Kumar. My entire childhood is dedicated to either dancing to Hindi film music or hearing it and listening to it. I think my whole desire to be a filmmaker comes from my obsession with music, so I always feel like that’s one thing that will always be part of my films — homage to that golden era of music and homage to Hindi cinema in general. In this film, I had actors from that era. I had to use one of the most romantic songs of Hindi Cinema. It had to be Abhi na Jao from Hum Dono. Oddly, both songs (the other — Jhumka gira re) in the film are Sadhna aunty’s. She was like my father’s Rakhi sister. I’ve heard these songs multiple times. I’ve heard stories about these songs, so it’s all in my head. And it’s all come through, it just bursts through this narrative very easily, organically, and from my heart.

Also read: Karan Johar conducts first AMA on Threads; responds to queries on his sexuality

25 years completed. What about the next 25 years if one were to look at the bigger picture?

People ask, do you get exhausted doing the same thing? And I’m like because you make so many films and tell so many stories, you never get tired because each story is different from the other. I want Dharma Productions to grow in terms of its infrastructure. I’d love to have my own post-production studio, my own music company, my own special effects, CGI division. I have so much in my head that I want to do. I feel I’m just getting started. I feel like the vision was not there earlier because I was trying to first mount the company into a zone of stability. I feel like my dreams will be realised from now onwards, like up to this point, my dream was just to solidify our company and make us have that dream of expansion. Now, I feel like we’re at that stage where we can dream further.

Twitter-  @namrata_joshi