A young woman who played an aging Kasturba
In her tastefully done up apartment in Mumbai’s Bandra, it is humbling to watch actor Rohini Hattangadi juggle between playing host to us and doing her own makeup. The 68-year-old is the first Indian actor to win a BAFTA (awarded by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts) and has also won a National Award. But the role that she is most well known for landed on her plate when she was 27. She played the character of Kasturba Gandhi in Richard Attenborough’s iconic 1982 film, Gandhi. Hattangadi revisits her memories of working in this iconic cinematic adaptation of his life. An edited version.
A young graduate from National School of Drama who’s more interested in theatre than cinema gets a call from Richard Attenborough to play a much older character. What was your first reaction?
Well, in the beginning, it was very naïve of me, but I didn’t know the scale of the film. For me it was just a role in an English film. Because of my theatre background, I was called for interview by Sir Richard — at that time he was Sir Richard, he became Lord afterwards — at the Centaur hotel. It was arranged by another theatre artist, Dolly Thakore, his liaison here. I told him that I’ve only done three films, but I have a theatre background. So our entire conversation was around theatre, with no mention of the film. The next day, Dolly wired me and I went to the grocer and called her, as I didn’t have a phone. She told me that I have been selected to go to England for a screen test (...) We were given a scene to do so, where Kasturba, in South Africa, refuses to clean the latrine [inside the Phoenix Farm settlement]. Like a disciplined theatre artist, I was fully prepared, right from my bindi down to the bangles and the mangalsutra. They had made three pairs of Gandhi and Kasturba for the audition. I was with Ben Kingsley, the second couple was Naseeruddin Shah and Smita Patil, and the third was John Hurt and Bhakti Barve. Ben and I made it.
Did Attenborough mention why the two of you made the cut?
I think when we did the scene, they had some inkling that Ben and I would make it because of the way we looked. Sir Richard did say that although he felt that Smita Patil was a wonderful actor, I looked more provincial and suited the part. He said Smita is too beautiful to play Kasturba!
Tell us about Ben Kingsley and the preparation you had to do to get into the skin of Gandhi’s character.
Ben and I had to learn to operate a charkha. In addition, I was trained in elocution because I needed to get rid of my Maharashtrian accent, while Ben was tough. We were supposed to research our characters. While Ben found a lot of literature on Mahatma Gandhi, I only found two books on Kasturba — Hamari Ba by Vanmala Parikh, and Ba Aur Bapu Ki Sheetal
Chhaya Mein by Sushila Nayar. Both books were very personal recollections of the authors, and, therefore, limited.
After he read Gandhi’s biography by Louis Fischer (The Life of Mahatma Gandhi), Sir Richard spent more than 18 years trying to make this film. Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru cleared the film, but after he died, the project was put on the back burner. Indira Gandhi backed the film and got the National Film Development Corporation to give funds. It had taken much for the film to finally come on the floors.
Again very naïve of me, I was not at all aware of these things. During the shoot, I realised that Sir Richard knew Gandhi backwards. I would struggle with calculating how old Kasturba would have been for significant scenes like the one on burning foreign clothes, but before I could consult the script, he would know the answer. When I read the biography, it was revealing how little we as Indians knew about Gandhi. I know that there was visible opposition to making the film. There were groups that said, “Gandhi par film kaise
bana sakte hain (How can anyone make a film on Gandhi?)”. Both Richard and Ben had personal security guards with them throughout the shoot.
What was it like on the sets? Was it very different from the previous three films you had done by then?
Oh, yes. The detailing on the sets of Gandhi was very minute. There was immense discipline and nothing was taken for granted. If Gandhi used a certain specific kind of utensil, then it had to be on the set. I remember our set was on the banks of Yamuna in Badarpur (Delhi border). And on the other bank, a cut-out of chimneys was needed. The unit got cut-outs exactly like those of textile mill chimneys in Ahmedabad. That side was not even in the frame, but they didn’t want to take any chances. In Mumbai, we were shooting scenes based in South Africa. And I suddenly saw zebras. I wondered where Sir Richard had brought zebras from. I was then told that they had painted stripes on donkeys to make them look like zebras! He said we can’t get South Africa’s giraffes here, at least we can manage zebras.
While filming, could you foresee that Gandhi would become such a commercial success and win critical acclaim? It fetched eight Academy awards and 130 million dollars at the box office.
There was a private show for the crew, and it left me speechless. Raungte khade ho
rahe the mere (I had goosebumps). After the release, people slowly started appreciating the film. India came to be known in the West because of Gandhi. Otherwise,