Frozen Rendezvous
Kenny and yours truly got an opportunity to meet the cast of Frozen. Here are some conversations we had in audio format:-
Danny Denzongpa
• Approach to get the correct emotions in a scene.
• Gestures in Agnipath
• Efforts to get the correct character, body language, behavior.
• Karma’s costume.
• How was the film unit treated.
• Memories of Kishore kumar.
• The break of Mere Apne.
• Films with Feroz Khan
• “I read even Spot Boy’s script”.
• Lack of originality in films.
• Directing a film.
• Karma’s item number 
Danny Denzongpa Audio Interview
Raj Zutshi
• Dynamics of playing a villain.
• Guru Naseerudin Shah’s mantra.
• Getting the attitude of Dawa right.
• RGV’s statement, while casting for Shiva.
• Using references from real life in playing a character.
• Generalization and particularization of acting.
• When the opportunity comes ‘hagna nahin’ (don’t shit).
• An actor getting naked and putting on clothes.
• How was the shoot of Frozen different.
• The preparation of Dawa’s role.
Yashpal Sharma
• The preparation of the character.
• His thoughts/input in the characterization.
• His best performance.
• A different experience
• Remembering Styajit Ray’s, ’Pather Panchali’.
• Life on the border.
• Essence of Frozen.
• Shivajee approach in directing actors
Shivajee intervenes and other things come to light
• Shivajee’s cameo in the film.
• Yashpal’s cover up acts
• SP’s dinner invitation
• Less day time during shoot.
• ‘AA’ censor certificate.
Yashpal Sharma Audio Interview
Sanjay Swaraj
• How is Frozen different from other films he has done.
• Frozen Cold.
• Acting skills.
• Realism in Frozen.
• People of Ladakh.
• Confession of Sin in Ladakhi style.
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
KBH !! Kya baat hai !!
Too good…Manjeet Singh…this is ‘The Best’ prelude to Frozen…Cannot wait to see the film…Shivajee bring it down quickly to Bangalore…
Danny’s voice is so young and energetic…speaks a lot about that man’s discipline…
Will write more after hearing others…too good..
Not only voice Ram……..just look at his pic with Kenny-Manjeet-SC !!! I simply could not believe my eyes !! He looked as young as Kenny ! In fact sorry Shivajee…he looked younger than you !! :-)
And yes I think I will make one day trip to India to see the movie !!
KCP…which picture??..is it there here above?? I doesnt show up in my comp though…strange
Ram- The pic is there in Facebook, dont think its here.
Manjeet,Kenny- good work.Have’nt heard the audio yet, will do it tom & write a little more.
good job guys
vintage PFC.
remembered the times when Anurag Kashyap’s audio interview of Black Friday was put.
Good Good
Happy Days are here again
truly amazing guys! thanks a lot. really great pieces n so nice to listen to all these people.
@ Ram V: go to kenny’s post on Frozen / Danny D.
he has uploaded some pix there. check out the ‘elder’ bro of kenny.
.
awesome effort manjeet oye. congrats for being the cynosure of all eyes right now…
@Jha..checked it out man…good ones..
Good Job, Manjeet !!
Its good. I really enjoyed Yashpal Sharma’s segment specifically….Thanks for this….
please put downloadable MP3 links, sorry don’t have have hi-speed connection, hope that is fine with PFC and Frozen Team.
whoa. i heard it all. such wonderful experiences… am kickin my arse thinking abt raj zutshi. i never thought of him beyond a charcter artiste. i remember he stood out for me in Goal & SRK wala 1-2-ka-4 and QSQT of course. but here it was a fucking revealation. such passion towards cinema. now i know what keeps the industry going behind the gloss n glam. its the sweat n toil of actors like raj, yashpal & others of their ilk. more power to the tribe of this passionate people dedicated to their craft. kenny, manjeet, u r guys r bloody lucky! thanks!
Magik, people like Raj Zutshi are the real actors. Stars are fine in their own place in that they get asses in theatre seats, but these are the real McCoys when it comes to actually acting
Kenny, Manjeet: such pleasure!! loved this
Jhakaas. Great. Completely engaging. Great Job guys.
http://movies.rediff.com/slide-show/2009/may/08/slide-show-1-danny-denzongpa-unplugged.htm
Danny Denzongpa comes across as a no nonsense man on screen. But meeting him personally is another story. One finds it hard to keep a straight face while talking to him as he can crack jokes non-stop.
His latest film, Frozen, however is serious. The film has been directed by Shivajee Chandrabhushan and releases this Friday. Danny talks to Patcy N, and takes her through his years in the Hindi film industry.
What is Frozen about?
I don’t know how to explain it, as I don’t want to give away the story. It is a simple story of a father, his daughter and son, who struggle to survive in a remote place in Ladakh.
He is very different from the fathers I have played earlier. I’ve played a violent and angry father in the past. But in Frozen, I play a very religious, mild and soft-spoken person.
How different is it from playing an aggressive villain to a nice gentle father?
Very difficult. Shivajee had to stop me many times because I would get angry. I would speak the dialogues loudly and even charge at my daughter to throttle her as I am so used to playing that kind of character.
You play the main character in this film. How does it feel to land lead roles even now?
I’ve always felt that whatever character I have played so far have always been the main characters. Even when I was playing a negative character, I always believed I was the hero because from the villain’s point of view whatever he is doing is right. It is important to believe in that character. Only then it will look convincing.
Why is the movie in black and white?
My director is a mad person. He shot the film in colour and printed it in black and white. I told them many times to at least make one print for Gangtok in colour. But nobody listened [laughs].
Colour would have not gelled with script. This is a kind of a film that has never been made here before. It is so authentic. Colour would have not suited it.
How was it working with Shivajee?
I thought there would be lots of problems as most of them are newcomers. I expected them to muck up the whole thing but surprisingly, all of them were very thorough and hard working. Every shot was preplanned and done in a proper manner. We finished the movie four to five days ahead of schedule. We shot for 28 days.
Why don’t we see more of you nowadays?
I have always done two to three films a year but this is the first time that I am doing five movies in a row like Endhiran, Luck, Acid Factory and The Man. Also, in between I took a break for three years. I was fed up. I reached a stage where I could not stand to see my face on screen.
Were you embarrassed of any movie or character you’ve played?
There are so many. I had done a film called Ponga Pandit. See, even the name is so funny. I played a singer who had to dance while wearing a huge hat. It was so huge that even my face could not be seen.
In fact, Boney Kapoor, Naseeruddin Shah, Raj Babbar, Anil Kapoor, and Mithun Chakraborty watched it over and over again laughing all the while. Naseerbhai told me he did a film with Rajshri production where his dance was even worse than mine.
What’s the favourite character you have played till date?
All the characters had their own flavour. But the one in Frozen is very close to my heart mostly because the entire film has been made in a very simple way. The character is very simple too. I think I succeeded in portraying it very well and I am very proud of it.
You had entered the industry to become a singer but instead, became an actor…
I wanted become an army officer. But then I join FTII where music and singing was part of the course. I sang with top singers of the country like Asha Bhosle, Lata Mangeshkar, Mohammed Rafi and Kishore Kumar.
Is it true that you were offered Sholay?
I was signed for Sholay. I had also signed Dharmatma with Feroz Khan and my dates were committed to him. Ramesh Sippy [director of Sholay] wanted the same dates. As I was shooting for Dharmatma in Afghanistan, I had to give up Sholay.
Do you regret not playing Gabbar?
I did then, because I wanted to do both films. But not any more. If I had done the film, I would not have succeeded the way Amjad (Khan) did. Amjad’s Gabbar was very different from what we had planned — which was a westernised Gabbar with long hair and strange getup. After Sholay became a big hit, Amjad increased his price and I increased mine as well. I signed about 10 films after that [laughs]. Sholay and Dharmatma released in the same month and both were superhits.
Gabbar was a popular character. What would be your most popular character?
My favourite would be the one in the Bengali movie Lal Kothi where I played a blackmailer who falls in love with the girl of the family he’s blackmailing.
You have acted with so many big actors. Any memories you would like to share with us?
There are many lovely memories. But the one I liked the most is that of Amitabh Bachchan. He is very professional and punctual. Once during the shooting for Hum, he got held up at home. So he called me to tell Mukul Anand that he would be late by half an hour. I told him that he should have been in the army.
He was also very helpful when we were shooting for Agneepath. We were in Mauritius and I was nervous as I was working with Amitabh for the first time. I wanted rehearse for the scene but as I did not get my dialogues, I yelled at Mukul. Amitabh, who was in the other room, heard me and came to my room to help me rehearse.
You came from a small town and made it big. Do you think others can do the same?
Yes, anyone can do it. It is much easier now.
What is Acid Factory about?
Acid Factory is a very commercial film. It is an action/suspense thriller.
Great insights into Raj Zutshi’s acting craft and Naseeruddin’s contribution to acting in India.
Got to hear/see a very humane Danny Denzongpa. It was heart warming.
Yashpal’s approach to acting and interpretation of character was also insightful.
Superb interviews Manjit. People were very comfortable being themselves and being recorded by you. Congratulations!
Is there a way, we can download the audio files as a collector’s item?