 It's that time of year again, where it goes from, I'll give you the Celsius in just a second, but it goes from 47 in the morning to 87 in the afternoon. That's basically going from 8 to 30 every day. So, at night we have the little space heater out, and in the afternoon we need the fan going, and sometimes we have them both going at the same time. Yeah, it's awful. Oh, we're getting a cold front. Sweet. Good. Moisture? 60s, no. For the highs? In next week. Awesome. 60s. Great. I'm done with this heat. It's always a gamble here, but when you have a big Thanksgiving dinner that's coming up, you really want it to be cold. I am actually against the heat. Rick is against the heat for like a month, and then he's like, I want summer back. Josh! Hey, we'll go back to our studio, but we're actually recording. Don't hate my love. You can follow us on Instagram and Twitter for our GC content. Every time you watch our Patreon, follow us on Twitter to subscribe, like, button. Today, we have an interview. It's a 2012 interview with Shah Rukh Khan. Awesome. All the filming is. Happy birthday. Yes. For the Rook himself. Am I right? You're right. People call him the Rook. They do? I do. Yeah. This is called THINK 2012. The Journey of a Dream Catcher. The Journey of a Dream Catcher. This is a very popular interview. People have been asking for a while, and so this is it. Here we go. Great. Shah Rukh Khan being his adorable, well-articulate self. Brand? One pixel in that entire thing. You ever get mistaken for a bird? Constantly. Yeah. Especially in profile. It's more of a turkey. It's a bird. They don't fly. I don't want to talk about who he is, but I do want to share three very short stories with you. About four or five years ago, I was trying to reach a man. I sent about two dozen SMSs. There was absolutely no response. It was like sending a beam into outer space. And then in utter frustration one day, I sent an SMS saying, Shah Rukh, do you exist or are you a unicorn? And in three minutes flat, I got a call back. We spoke, and then we decided to meet for a story. I went down to Bombay. I went up a hill. There was a studio there. The sun was setting. There were charred buildings everywhere, men with walkie-talkies dressed in black guns, a sort of hush in the air. And then suddenly somebody dressed in a red suit, in a sort of Superman cape swooshed into the air, holding a woman, a beautiful woman in a red dress, a long split down her leg. They swooshed up into the sky, the cape flying. And then this man and this woman came down, and this man said, Uribaba, my name is muhabbat man. Let's dance. And then a year later, we met at Bonham's in London. And two legendary people had agreed to paint a canvas to help fund the helicopter that was going through extremely rough times financially. And we held an art exhibition there, again, where the artist community supported us hugely by painting canvases for free. And we wanted to auction this, raise funds for the journalism. Bonham's is a very elite auction house in London. The biggest crowd they've ever seen is 300 people. We told them maybe 450 might turn up. And then this man walked into Bonham's. And Bonham's had 1,800 people in a hall that could accommodate 300. The auction was a washout. Nobody knew what was happening. But everybody's eye was on this one man. His friends say that for him and for others who wait for him, time begins when he arrives. He's here today, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Shah Rukh Khan. Oh, they're talking about Shah Rukh Khan? Thank you. Thank you very much. Good evening, everybody. That was a weird cut. I've auditioned for many parts. But for the thing fest, the auditioning happened. And I was passed by Shoma straight away when I said, Uri Baba, I'm muhabbat man. This guy's smart. We have to get him for a thing. Thank you, Tam. Thank you, Nina. Thank you, everybody who's involved with this. And that's it. That's it. That's it. Shah Rukh, as I said. So before I start, because I was told, one of my friends, Sanjoy, my oldest friend, oldest in terms of years that I've known him, he's told me this is like an intelligent gathering. So you actually prepped for it. I was aghast when Shah Rukh's colleague called me and said, Shah Rukh wants to know what you're going to talk about. Are there any questions? And I was like, Shah Rukh's asking for questions. I've become careful now because you never know what girl come and write about you. I'm scared now. I'm a little scared of what I say. So I have written something. Is it okay to read it out? Yeah, but can we do the conversation? Did you bring your book? I just wanted to... That's why I don't go to any place where stars are considered less than the anchors. I'm telling you. But I'm here now. Shah Rukh, when I asked you to come here, I told you that the really unique experience that I wanted our audience to have is that Shah Rukh is in the process of writing his memoir and his autobiography. And about two years ago, we met and he shared some snatches of that with me. And they were incredibly moving. They were an aspect of Shah Rukh that you don't really get to see very often. And that is the framework of our conversation today. The public and private journey of this Dreamcatcher. And that's how I'd like to enter the conversation with you, Shah Rukh. The piece you read to me was about your parents. Both of them have been very seminal in who you are today. And yet they were both very different people. Your father was a freedom fighter. He was an idealist, very accomplished man, but a poor man. And your mother was much more of a pragmatist. Can you talk to us about what they meant in your life and how they've influenced you in different ways? Yeah, my father, in the book that I'm still writing, which has been now... I decided to write the book when I thought I would last after four, five years into the film industry. I started believing that I would last for 10 years. Sorry, technical glitches. Hopefully that's the last one. In 20 years? I'm a little tardy with it. I still haven't finished it. Now it's 22 years that I've been working. The book is still not complete. And in the book, the chapter that I made, the main exposure of my inner self is that I think my father was the most successful failure in the world. And I'm very, very proud of him. And I remember him as a very gentle person, six feet tall, very pathan, grey eyes, brown hair, very handsome. I also remember the first time I went to Peshawar with him. I love that. Thank you for that. Six feet, two inches, very fair, very beautiful. And I remember the whole family met me first time and I was about 14 and they said, they speak Hindi there, like Punjabi. And they looked at me and said, Innu ke ho gaya. Ete pathan lagdai nahi hai. In answer, I'm that kind of pathan. And he taught me a lot of things. He died when I was 15. And as... Same age in drowning, lost her dad. He never told me. I remember he took me out for a movie. Never told me. We belong to a place where, you know, in terms of finances, lower middle class or however it's described, we don't... we don't have the money. He used to travel in buses 501, 502, Panswek, Pansodho, Dilliwali, Pansodhas. And he took me and... he didn't tell me money is run out. So he made me sit in the... there used to be a roundabout near Khamani auditorium. And we bought moong fali. And he said, And he used to also speak a little bit of Punjabi. He said, He never told me my mom who was Haitharabadi and a little more pragmatic as you said. And a little more talkative and loud. She said, So my mother was extremely... I think after he died, she kind of dedicated her life to look after me. She said, So my mother was extremely... I think after he died, she kind of dedicated her life to look after us. And the essence of both my parents was that they didn't know what we'd become. My father was a non-practicing lawyer because he said he can't lie. So sorry if there are some lawyers here. We said, He was the youngest freedom fighter of this country in terms of age. And my mother was a magistrate, but she was like a go-getter and very enthusiastic. And after he died, she carried on the dream my father had that we should make sure that children are well educated. If they get educated, life will be okay for them. Of course, I've wasted all my education. I've done sciences and economics and then masters in mass communication. And I became a film star. And so it kind of doesn't come handy when you're doing, You are my Chammukh children. And that's it. So I remember them. I think I've imbibed the fear of failure that I saw my father go through and I didn't want to fail like him. I want to take my son out. If I promise him for a movie, I want to show him a movie, not the cars around the roundabout. So that was fun too. And the enthusiasm and the energy that my mother had to earn money so that, you know, she could look after us and educate us. They both died, I think, between the ages of 49 and 50. I just turned 47 day before yesterday, so it's a little scary thought. But it was an education which makes me a very pragmatic, practical poet, I think. Yeah, it makes me a very commercial poet, I think. It makes me someone who has dreams like my father did, someone who's as gentle as I am, notwithstanding the Mumbai Cricket Association incident. We'll come to that. Oh. But, yeah, so I'm a believer. I'm a little idealistic and utopian and thoughtful and gentle like my dad. But I want to do all those thinking and write all those poems with a stomach full of food and have a good car and a good house. So I don't divide myself or duplicate myself when I say I'm kind of capitalist. It is just that I am a survivor who wants to live well and think well. And I think all youngsters should believe that. If you isolate one of them, I've been hearing amazing amount of dedicated work from some of the people extremely educated and highly positioned jobs leaving everything and looking after a cause which is close to their hearts. I would like to do that. But being from the place I believe which is kind of honest, I'd like to do it with the money that I earn from this capitalist, this in-your-face business-like job that I do. So I want to, I invite, I think, both the things that my mom and dad taught. I still miss them a lot. Yeah, in fact, Shahrukh he used to run a tea canteen behind the NSD and you were thrown out of your house once because they couldn't pay the rent. Are you going to tell everything about me? Thank you. It's a resisting operation. This is stuff you've told me. Okay. And not with any privacy clauses. But, you know in fact in an interview some years back and I'm just, why I'm asking you all this is because very much the man you are, some of that comes through in the tweets that you do at three o'clock at night and four o'clock at night, not when you meet you on the stage or in the cinema screen. And you said that your sister, your mother died in very difficult circumstances and you said your sister also is a kind of daily reminder that you cannot have the life that your father has. Your father lived and your father had. Can you share that with us? What really happened? Because a lot of that went into making you the kind of superstar that you are. Yeah, my father died of cancer, throat and liver, started with throat and I remember the last few days he couldn't speak. So we used to play dumb charades and you know we used to kind of, he used to write stuff, then he couldn't write stuff so he would say call, little, and then brother or sister. So I remember this was at all India Institute of Medical Sciences at the Jung Hospital. And he obviously like any father was in love with his daughter and she was very beautiful. Everyone used to think she looked like J. Infant, but the poorie family was from there. She was extremely beautiful and when my father died I remember he was getting well then I went to the hospital one night and he was dead and cold. His feet were very cold. So I touched his feet and he was very peaceful and dead and not look like the handsome Patani was. And I had never driven a car. I was 15 and I remember my mom and me sat in the car to get back home. A driver who had waited all night, couldn't wait any longer, had left the car abandoned in front of the main road. And I sat in the car and drove back. I do remember my mother, when we reached home she said how did you learn how to drive? And I said when did you learn? And I said just now. And I was driving a car. I came home. My sister was in Lady Shiram College and we didn't tell her that her father has passed away. So I went, I got her and I remember this and because I'm a soul selling commercial actor one day I would use this in a film also Shamelessly. But 99% of the things that I use so shamelessly in films is an experience which is very close to my heart. And somehow life has taught me it's all right to show the innermost of my feelings in the commercial sense. Not to earn money, but just it's okay. It's one life. So I will use this. I remember my sister standing in front of my father's Parthiv Sharip Uttar dead body and she just looked. She didn't cry. She didn't say anything. She just fell and she hit her head on the ground and for two years after that she didn't cry. She didn't speak. She just kept looking in space. Wow. And it just changed her world. Mashallah. Now she's better. She got some deficiencies. During the making of my film Dilwale Durande, she again was hospitalized and they said she will not survive. I took her to Switzerland. I got her treated there while I was shooting. Toche dekhato yeh jana sanam. But she hasn't ever recovered from the loss of her father. The suddenness of him passing away. And then it got compounded because my mother also expired 10 years later. So we are what in Muslims is called yateem and yaseem. Father and motherless. And when I see her, especially the time period from my father's death to my mother's death, she was highly qualified. She has done MLLB. Very intelligent. Like my parents wanted her to be. But she could not face the reality of losing her parents. And I somehow developed the sense of detachment. The sense of false bravado which I show in public. A sense of humor. A lot of things that I do which people think is flamboyant and very poly would like to cover up. The sadness affecting my life and me becoming like my sister. I love my sister how she is. She is a much better person than I can ever be. I think she is a child of God and very naive and innocent. My kids love her more than they love me and my wife. And I am very glad she is a part of our lives like this. But I don't have the guts to be so simple, so hurt, so disturbed. So a part of me keeps on working around the clock, keeps on being happy in spite of things which are said about me or make a joke about things that I do but still keep doing them because if I did not do it I think I would be in the same state of potassium deficiency and depression. So to avoid depression I act. It's much larger than to earn money or be a big star or do endorsements or dance at weddings which I joke about. And this is the God's honest truth. I think this is the most honest I've ever been in my life to anyone. Sharif before before we move away from this this series of central events that happened in your life and you know how it continues to pursue you would you share with the audience that snatch about your father passing away? Did you bring it with you? I'm sorry I have it on my laptop. You know I tried to print out a lot of things but technologically we are a little challenged still. You had it on your Kindle. Yeah I can get the laptop. I'll ask them to bring it and do it in a moment or two. So we'll come back to that. Have I screwed up major with this disorganization of mine? I'm really sorry. This is very small but I'll still this is an incident about this chapter is called The Claim to Pakistan. I finally learned that life isn't a timed test with a goal is to make a list of shudas, kudas, udas on January 1st and finish as fast as possible with every answer correct and be perfect about it. I have taken things from what I've said and started my chapter so I won't read the whole chapter I'll bore you but I'll describe the portion when my father who had taken me twice to Peshawar and we had gone always through Amritsar work through to Lahore where I even did a film called Vizara which brought back a lot of memories and I cried there because I had done the same with my dad so I'm just reading you the last part where the second time we went every time my father told me a lot of stories about how wonderful his hometown was Kisakhhani and Lahori di Hatti and how many people were happy my father by the time I was born wasn't doing well business wise wives as they are always well you know why don't you do something so I think he needed to go back to his past to keep on telling me how wonderful it was and he took me twice to Peshawar this is the second time in 1980 when he took me so I'm just reading the last bit which I read to Shoma my father got me back to Peshawar once again in 1980 the second time round was also turning out to be as exciting but without my knowledge there was something else taking place right under my nose I was told by my father's friend that all this niceness that my cousins were showing me was to impress my father into leaving his share of property in their names I still don't believe that was true but my father seemed to be dejected when we returned back to India my father was always very proud of his family and their achievements but in retrospect I think that his going back to his family was not as great an experience as he'd anticipated he was a very loving and gentle person never having screamed at us or reprimanded us he had left his house when he was 16 he had tried desperately to try and make things work in India I think at times when he felt he hadn't succeeded with his duties to his family in India he had taken courage from the fact that his family in Pakistan had brought him up well and he would be able to fight back maybe his journey back home was to refresh this resolve and he had taken his little son along to give him a taste of his lineage I think it was like trying to revisit his past and pass it on to his future it's like when you're a little lost you try to retrace your steps to figure out where you went wrong but the past had changed with time it was not the same for him the memory of all the anecdotes and good times he had collected with pride over the years seemed tainted by the bickering and fight for something as menial as the possession of his property rights he had got his son along to introduce him to his proud past but the past wasn't there and what was left of it was not something to be proud of either instead of finding out where he had gone wrong he realized that the bickering itself was a mistake he was too far gone to start all over again neither side seemed to be his he was in the no man's land I remember him crying while walking along the no man's land between Pakistan and India and I felt sad for him little did I know by the time we got back I would have to start feeling sad for myself my father was beginning to die and this is an incident where I remember is this the book that the lady from film companion from Pakistan Anupam Chopra she wrote his memoir I know there are a lot of confusing discussions about India Pakistan and I'm okay if this leads to some kind of controversy but he was like he just told me the food is better the people are good and he's to keep telling the bamboos are better than Peshawar I don't know for some reason they are better than Peshawar and you believe your father whatever he says so till my dying day I remember the bamboos come from Peshawar for some reason and I remember he was walking in between the no man's land and he started crying and you know to see your father cry is like a mega thing for a 14 year old kid and he said I said but it was really nice your country and he said to me you know actually I'm feeling like neither that nor that is my country the no man's land that he was walking because Peshawar felt he's not succeeded here and his you know his past was not good enough to take him through where he wanted his son to be and I truly believe that visit not because of his cousins and his brothers you know that whatever that's a young kid's belief but I think he just got so completely wasted by the fact that you know neither of the two things were working for him in the past or future and I think he died that day while walking back because he died about three months after that he came home and he fell sick so in spite of people telling me politically not to go to Pakistan I have other reasons which are a little more personal thank you very much we'll come back to some of those early years but there was another interesting you know the kind of guy you were in Delhi and the man you have become in Bombay and you were two very different people you know can you share with us the kind of college kid you were tempestuous I won't add on to the adjectives you tell us yourself and how you've designed yourself as a superstar great question I was always like this very elegant how you've designed yourself you know he's quite Matthew Perry and his self-effacing you know being a Delhi boy like being a New Yorker I would imagine same kind of proud sense and also aggressive I was kind of like that brought up like that I was in an Irish weather school so I was having this strange dichotomy of being brought up where everything was there we spoke like that in the morning shoes are not shined Mr Khan as a matter of fact I was called Mr Shah because Khan till you're 18 so my name was Shah Rukh and my Irish brothers thought that either my name is Mr Shah my parents name was Mr Rukh so I was like Mr Shah if I was Gujarati for a part of my life I you know in Delhi everybody just fights for the rights nice reference so I was brought up like that when I came to Mumbai I got into a lot of fights and I didn't understand the stardom stuff I'm from Delhi you talk nicely everybody has to be well mannered I'm very well mannered I'm very courteous that's the upbringing I have and the Irish but I didn't understand the stardom so the first time when I came I remember there was a magazine which I was just talking about downstairs where they kind of put me on the cover of a magazine and had written a line that I had sort of been how do you put it decently in a thing first physical with a co-actress and I hadn't been so I was banging the shit out of this I thought it was Irish by the school this is the dhili wala part and I didn't understand this yeah you were a young girl when she was 14 I just got married she was about 22 for her this guy becoming a movie star what you think of Bollywood in that time it was just the Indian film industry and you know she was so worried will I be doing what supposedly movie stars will do and do in the films apart from acting and this whole thing came out and I'm like you know but this is not true and so I called up this lady and I said um you know why have you written this she's a charu it's a joke she's a joke but it's not funny lady do you hear me talking laughing and I wasn't saying it like this my dhili wali kata laughing it wasn't her mistake I think but she didn't understand what I was talking because you know I was speaking in dhili language I went there I fought I beat up people and I had some really really nasty stuff which is a natural thing that dhiliites do they don't know in the other parts of the country it's considered nasty so I behaved really badly and I was jailed and my father in law had given me as they do in Delhi in Punjabi weddings a sword to carry on the goli when I got married to my wife Gauri and um I carried that sword to that journalist's house laughing you're exaggerating now yeah my father in law had told me he's now my officer so he said son make sure you protect my daughter laughing nobody was saying anything to her daughter I thought this is a good weapon and sanctioned by the Indian army laughing so I went there and I remember that young boy he shifted to Vancouver since then yeah that's different now now that I've become a gentleman so he was sitting there in his shorts and the whole office was sitting there and I took it was a kukri actually it was not even a sword so I took the kukri and I stuck it between his legs and I don't know why I can't see it now that I think of it I looked at his parents and I said you know I'm gonna cut him up and the poor old couple were just sitting they didn't understand anything they were like you know so many other people have come for dinner and a chat why is this gentleman behaving like this beta and why is he trying to do this with a sword between your legs and so I got into a big fight and then one day I was next day and I thought I've done the thing I'll cut it I'll break it like kind of I've repeated my dialogues at MCA how I did all that stuff and then I went away thinking I won this battle next evening I was shooting for a film called Kabihya Kabina which is one of my favourite films and I was acting like a comic Don ironically and cops came who were very sweet they talked to me they took pictures with me and then they said sir has called you my mother was a magistrate I've been in jail in Delhi many times these things work in Delhi you can make a call and say my mummy is a magistrate so for a few fights and all my mother had gotten me out of the lock up mom wasn't alive but they took me and they took me after six o'clock so I can't get bail I remember there was this gentleman Inspector Mr Khan and I went in with my swagger he was standing there I was from Delhi so I had to walk like that so I stood and I was going to say yes, what's that and I'm like today my mother was alive so sir he put me in a lock up and then he said you're allowed to make one phone call and that's when I realized I'm cut out to be a Hindi film hero because instead of making that one phone call to my family, friends or any lawyer that I would have had which I didn't, I made the call to that guy who had reported me and I said now I'm in jail and now I'll leave and I'll cut you off is this going to get me in trouble I doubt it and if it will you're well prepared this RTI, India Against Corruption won't take out these papers and put me back I guess I do remember that I went back to the guy's house there were cops outside his house and I asked for a light from one of the cops who was very still he lit my cigarette I opened the window, looked at that guy I said I'm coming to get you now I threatened the everyone in their office but then it so happened they put my fingerprints and then this Inspector Khan Sahib told me revenge tastes the sweetest when it is served cold so 19 years ago I'm still waiting for when that vancouver will return I just felt I was very embarrassed and I decided to change myself because the wife was very disturbed Nana Pataka got me out of the jail finally on a weekend there is an evening court that gives you bail and I tried to be decent and I kind of have changed now I tried to be the more Irish weather school educated than the dilly university hockey player and sometimes the dilly kakunda jumps up again what I'm feeling very bad about is that some of the people have started saying that it's my midlife crisis and I'm having a meltdown I was telling Tarun to be a backstain Sanjoy and everyone that it wasn't youtube then if it was youtube then my fights would be there so this fight is happening so it comes naturally so I just want to say this and all you really intellectual people I'm not going through a midlife crisis I'm good I'm really good I'm cool and I'm I'm just going through the dilly phases once in a while that's all Sharif the other fascinating strand in you is your relationship with Islam and with being a Muslim over the years you've become more overt about just identifying yourself as a Muslim you know and you're not a political person at all why did you want to start doing this and you know you also see you're a real chauvinist and you're an Islamist chauvinist you know so how do the two things sit together I don't understand I'm getting scared big big words you're using with me but I to be honest like I have been living in Delhi like I said and I participated in Ram Leela I have studied in Irish by the school so I'm made to in every nice way I know the Ram Ramayan very well the Mahabharat very well because I used to act in them and you know whole Punjabi atmosphere because of my upbringing in Saint Columbus so I know the Bible very well and it's very strange I never thought I'll be an actor but I've enacted pieces and bits in school on the stage in Delhi Patel Nagar and by birth I'm Muslim you know I'm Islamic so my father and mother in a very nice way have explained Islam to me and as I've grown now and I have kids I'm very secular my wife's a Hindu and I've never tried to impose my religion on her neither has she ever I really believe to be very honest each religion is about being easy with each other's selves and each other's religion so I am like that but now when the kids were growing up and all this was happening around the world I just felt that my parents have always taught me and my understanding and reading about Islam is that we are very peaceful so in no political way as you said in no shauvinistic way as you mentioned but the way I only know through a film of mine maybe so I was looking for an opportunity which I got in my film my name is Khan that I want to say that you know it's an extremely peaceful religion and that's all I want to impose upon even my children that if they can learn anything from Islam being now Aryan Khan and Suhana Khan I think the only thing they need to really take back is the fact that it's a very peace loving religion and they are growing up in times where every bomb that is being bombed every bullet that is being fired is supposedly by Muslim people you know and I don't want my kids to have that kind of an impression because I truly believe that maybe most of these guys at least a big majority of these guys do not really stand for Islam they stand for their own agenda of whatever fundamentalism they want to get through or their political ideologies or whatever issue they have with nation to nation a person to person but I don't think necessarily they stand for Islam so I started reading all over again in the languages that I know English and Hindi I started speaking to some really wonderful people like Javed Sahib who might be here tonight who are like really well versed with Islam I speak to them, I talk with them Inshallah I'd like to do the Hajj with my kids but the imposition of my religion would be to the extent of saying that it's an extremely peace loving and wonderful religion and the film was for that and though like again my behavior lately does not really you know like my son can turn around and we have a great sense of humor so this is a joke please don't take it wrong I'm saying this but like you know my son does and I got into this fight with another person at night and you know I came back and I woke them both up I'm very embarrassed about how I behave in films, off screen everything that I do with my kids so I woke them up and I said you know I slapped a guy and I'm really sorry and my son and this is a joke so please don't take it wrong he said that's very like a Muslim Baba I said I don't want him to think of that and we joke and we say things like voila and the thing is that I've been able to bring them to be able to joke about it now means I'm on the right path of explaining to them that Islam is an extremely peaceful religion like I'm sure Hinduism is and Buddhism is and Christianity is before we start talking about some other aspects of your life did you bring that part the first page of what it means to be a star the first page of your book you're kind of watching yourself and did you bring any other bits of it I have now the whole laptop I've got the script of my next two films if you want me to read them out 2012 so that would be I can't figure out which two films are oh sorry that either I printed out I thought maybe after I've read my opening speech which you haven't allowed me to read out my last chapter of the book so it'll kind of make everyone feel what a wonderfully organized and grounded talk we had tonight but this is really true this book was like I said I wrote it I started writing it long so my daughter was only four or five this chapter is now she's 12, eight years ago and this would be this will be the last chapter I'm filling in the rest of the blanks but I think this will be the last chapter I started writing this book while I was standing jumping for a movie called Pipi de la Hindustani from a 16th story building onto an airbag and I do not exaggerate I have done that and this thought came to me that I should write a book because Mahesh Bhatt Sahib had told me so the book starts I was going to say the movie starts like that the book is like a movie and now it's the last chapter and I'm still standing there so a lot of it has to be updated so please bear with me but this was eight years ago it's been one hell of a trip it's been one hell of a life a busted knee, an ankle which needs repair a big toe which is much bigger than any big toe a neck which has one disc less and is still capable of doing the boogie boogie let me also share a secret let me also share a secret I dye my hair I've been atop a train and under a moving truck I have romance in oxygen less Ladakh and fought in the slush I have jumped from multi-storey buildings and hung from cliffs I have stood in the same frame as Mr. Ramita Bachal I've been a hug by Raki Dilip Kumar has spattered me on my cheek and praised me for playing Devdas Madhuri Dixit has danced in front of me for nine nights Juhi Chawla has made coffee for me Kajal has bought me books to read Amrish Puri has shared a dirty joke with me I have met Madonna and said hello to Michael Jackson Harry Potter has stood and talked with me for 15 minutes I have said the namaz in the deserts of Egypt close to the pyramids I have climbed the Eiffel Tower people in Japan know me by name mothers in Indonesia and Gaena call me their son Yash Chopra and Subhash Ghai are my friends and I have met them and I have met them Yash Chopra and Subhash Ghai are my friends Maniratnam thinks I can act a bit Urgence on the road copy my way of talking Baba shops on the roadside have a haircut named after me I have a nice house and lovely children my son thinks I'm a hero and this is eight years ago and my daughter thinks I'm Amir Khan she was young and stupid then so at home she knew I'm Papa on TV she used to think and she used to see me and take that name ironically and then there is a star in the sky which I talk about in the chapters earlier which I think is my mother like every child does which shines extra bright with happiness when I go out stand on my terrace it's like I have lived two life lifetimes in one I have crammed 20 years of experiences and happiness in a decade what am I? Spider-Man? Superman? No I think I'm blessed there are times when I feel I still feel lonely there are days when I feel very sad at my failures the sea in front of my bungalow makes me feel just as little as it did ten years ago I cannot answer the question which is asked to me in every interview what is the real Shah Rukh Khan like maybe there is no real left real me left anymore maybe there is no real emotion left which I haven't done in front of the camera already maybe I'm just an act now sometimes I don't recognize my face without the makeup on sometimes I don't come alive till I hear the sound of the Arri Flex, Arri Flex is the camera or this would think fast everyone would know that some days even the sound of the camera and the lights in my eyes don't help me to feel real the boundaries between the real me and the real me have faded beyond repair do I love like Rahul or does Rahul love like me is it Raj's anger or am I angry playing Raj over and over again I know I would never throw a girl off a terrace but I'm not sure if like Dev Das I would destroy myself for a girl maybe maybe not would my son grow up to be normal would my daughter realize I'm not Amir Khan I don't know and I don't care really have I paid a big price for being a star no if I was given a choice I would do it all over again and would be willing to give even more would I die happy only if my last film was a hit as for now I'm looking forward to the next 20 years just when you thought it was safe to assume I will retire now that I've written a book I'm going to subject you to another decade the green cloth is fluttering behind my back the 40 odd feet don't seem too much I know why I do this I do it because I'm an actor I spread out my hands close my eyes I can hear the storm fans loud and clear I see my son's face he thinks I'm a hero he knows I have wings I know too God is kind and with me I also know I can fly I let go I'm flying and so is the rest of the world with me to be continued after a decade later I know I have a publisher who's going to kill me for doing this but now I believe the bell is rung before I even began to start talking to you okay so are you going to root with me and tell me to get out of it now why no chamakshal ho just one or two more questions if you all will allow me we're running short of time but Shahrukh one sees these fragments of you the public self of you is somebody completely different flamboyant as you said somebody who loves wading into crowds but there's an element in you that's always alone as I said at three o'clock four o'clock at night your tweets are always about this separation of self from the public why is that persisted over the years has nothing filled up the vacuum in you honestly no I don't know there is something wrong with me and I sense it I feel it but I don't know what it is I love to act also I believe as far as now is concerned I always want to keep working to fill in the time I have a beautiful family they're very loving to me and I get really the only happiness I get is with them I've got a few friends who love me a lot I spend a lot of time with them but I find myself sometimes my personal life and my public life and I try to give I'm an actor I'm supposed to give and whatever people say about me he's like this he's like this he's like that I know sometimes and I know it honestly there is no other reason for me to be doing this than to fulfill a desire to give I don't wake up anymore in the mornings thinking how many carols my film has made I don't want to know which star has done well but I can't explain it because sometimes with all their good intentions or silly ones people only ask me this how do you feel this star has done this and I get angsty and angry but I control myself less time put in jail again or fight again so I control myself and I put up a brave front and I keep on acting and I make it flamboyant and I make it humorous and I make it fun it's very nice to be and I'm saying it honestly I somehow feel that people here will at least if not completely feel it understand what I'm talking about and you know every day the reason to go and act is not like I said the carols or number one, number two or number two and three or 40, 45 and 100 crore and 200 I don't want it anymore I've got everything much more than a boy sitting on the roundabout in Kamali auditorium watching cars go by because his father can't afford to buy a film ticket can have you can't take that away from me you can't you can take away the awards the money you can't take away the fact that I became Shah Rukh Khan I became somebody else really so I so why do I do it and this is very deeply emotional for me so why do I do it and I've only said this here I only do it because I know somewhere in some strange place a lonely mother with a strange child is just having a great laugh watching one film of mine somewhere and when I think of the reason that I do what I do this for whether it is because I lost my parents early I can't keep on harping about it everybody loses parents get over it do I do this because I worked hard I became a star and XYZ and now the money is important the awards I've done enough of that but somewhere there is this feeling of emptiness which I started to share in twitter but that also became sound bites for television and tabloids they take it out of context and put it and I can't explain to them so I have this restlessness this this strangeness this unfulfilledness which I feel I'm going to fill it in with as much acting as much I can give but it doesn't happen it doesn't happen and so I now have dedicated my life to come out in public and give you what you want if you want me to dance I'll dance for you if you want me to sing I'll sing for you if you want me to stand on my hands I'll still do that because he's not a serious enough actor I'll accept it if somebody says you know what he's too flamboyant he's not the guy who's going to do socially relevant films it's alright I'm not going to do ten of them I'll do what I feel like but I will do most of the time things that I think you want me to do there is nothing left in my life I feel that I want to do for myself so it's a very strange selfless selfish place I have as I said in the beginning I think turned into a commercial poet so I have the thoughts of a poet I want to do good things I want to do creative things I want to be gentle but I don't want to I don't want to die like my father did and I don't want to be unknown despite being the most wonderful father despite being the I don't know as much as I love calling my dad a successful failure I'd like to be just very successful that's all honestly and they write when they say I didn't believe it but believe you me it is very lonely at the top so you have to you have to be lonely when you try to be successful Shahrukh you said you'll dance for us but because this is thing and you've made it so special you want to read what you brought finally do you have time? we'll stop with just one thing whenever you want to stop just stop it just say cut so I really this is really nice thank you so much I've had it's so strange that some of the personal things I would like to discuss with my best friends not that Shoma has knocked my best friend but it's nice to share it with everyone I don't know these are very so thank you thank you I've been very depressed for the last two days I have no reason for it I just romanticize as the dark space that creative people go into but thank you very much for listening to all this it make me feel very happy so I'm gonna drink a lot have a great evening with you guys but I'm thank you for allowing me to read this this is a little part of a poem that I read I prepared this in the plane for you Shoma and for Thal Khang everyone here and it's not in any sequence we just thought that we're coming because I was sent your email that it's about the solitude of being a movie star or a superstar so it's a part of a poem from W. H. Odin that's how you pronounce it so I wish you first a sense of theater only those who love illusion and know it will go far otherwise we spend the lives in a confusion of what we say and do with who we really are this is Odin's poem to a 7 year old I think grandson or the son adulation has the distinct quality of isolation you cannot admire that which you cannot distinguish as extra ordinary to be adored in the manner of stardom is to be brutally separated from the right to be ordinary paradoxically this severance results in making nothing more stark to a man than his own ordinariness I'm aware of it hide it or pretend it away but he feels it in the most naked of ways stardom presents a unique opportunity to accept or reject ordinary because the isolation it imposes has two aspects one is to enable detached clarity the other to cloud reality entirely it is easy when faced with the truth about one's ordinariness to turn away from it the way of the mist is to diffuse form it is easy to unravel hard to hold the imperfection of yourself and sift unbridled adulation into a genuine love for your craft and person it is hard but it is possible it is possible when you begin to create for the sheer joy of creation or creating because somehow you're not in the business of destruction acting is an art form it is often mistaken as the ability to pretend but in fact it is the ability to mirror different selves onto the canvas of your own being it is the art of becoming a new self with complete honesty an actor true to his craft cannot reject his imperfections he embraces them and turns them into creative force isolation enables the detached observation of himself and his work through which an actor can enhance this creative force attachment of a certain kind allows complex emotions to be worn like costumes in my case because I do commercial films the costumes are very simple Ralph Lauren Anger Dolce & Gawana Love Patchy Ooty Romance just about describes my complete emotional wardrobe as the world changes this interpretation is rendered more and more through various media I become a cad a philanderer a womanizer an abusive drunk a callous arrogant star who flouts rules and smokes indiscriminately in public an anti-national enemy supporting upstart who ought to be taught a lesson and so on or a perfect family man an astute businessman a doting father sex on toast or even just a guy who smells beautiful none of this has to do with who I really am yet it becomes the way I'm perceived by many here is where my public journey deviates from my personal experience and sometimes pushes me into a more isolated space than I wish to be detached or attached the one thing I cannot avoid is what my persona is interpreted as seen from the outside as honest and similar as I believe my public and personal appearances and beliefs are I do get overtaken by what people want to perceive of me because of being completely objectified over the last 20 years my emotions and actions are all objects open for sale and analysis a billion dollar soul-selling machine who romanticizes leaving on Mumbai sidewalks before becoming such a beautiful object but I do not gain satisfaction from the money I earn from how many crores my movies collect as I said for whether I'm rated as number one, two or two hundred and three I never wake up in the morning wondering about who has become more popular than me it is of no concern to me I gain satisfaction from the aspect of my art that allows me to give I feel satisfied at the thought that somewhere in a home I do not know a mother and a little son watch my movie on an otherwise dull day and laugh at me I gain satisfaction at the fact that people leave the cinema with lightness in their heart feeling love feeling the possibilities of romance in their everyday ordinariness of their daily lives however unreal it seems to critics or lovers of reality I serve reality with chocolate flavored popcorn only in large size and fizzy soda to go with it and yet, this last bit I heard the bell and yet I live reality in its crudest form where every human defect and perfection is magnified where every desire, every aspiration is tart like mine where every power drives an enormous system towards its own growth and churning and even destruction but it tastes bloody good and through all this I'm surrounded by a hundred managers and PRs and producers and financers and the only way I keep it sane is by clinging to the only person I know the best myself all alone but to be alone amidst millions of admirers is no tragedy at all it is beautiful especially if you can use it to view the world as I began the speech with a sense of theatre so welcome to my theatre ladies and gentlemen ladies and gentlemen the dream catcher thank you very much and I'm sorry for the next speaker having to wait, thank you very much everyone thank you thank you AJ for the subtitles stupid baby thank you for that it was a stupid baby that did that so thank you so much it obviously helps in understanding certain yeah it was mostly in English but it said certain things that he explained yeah in certain context for things we always appreciate that always a love listening to show work on always because we said he's people have criticized me when I say certain people are well articulate like I don't know why they would because certain people are well why would you articulate that? it's like saying that there's people who are well educated versus not regardless of if they speak English or a different language certain people are very well articulate and certain people aren't as well articulate yeah it's just how it is Johnny Depp is not an articulate man so like he's a very articulate man what he said and only as usual whatever he has a very unique circumstance in life that maybe two other people can probably relate to a mere con or a few other people in India can probably relate to yeah I'm gonna talk about John Superstar Rashid concept of the world but very few others but I love his sense of humor I love his introspectiveness about his life about his work about I just I love listening to him I think he's such an easy listen he's such a fun listen because he doesn't take himself seriously but he also is very serious about certain things he says as well I love it I do too did we see a clip of this before I think we saw I think we saw the clip of him going with the sword to the guy or at least him talking and going to jail yeah at least him talking about that either heard that story before or saw an excerpt from this but yeah boy one of my favorite takeaways among many in this thing was when he was talking about he was reading what he wrote about himself and questioned who is the real me and who is the real me and I'm sure what he was spelling was the R-E-E-L me and the R-E-A-L me and just wonderfully introspective simultaneously light-hearted quizzically deflective and defensive with humor yet at the same time extremely transparent very very like I can listen to him talk all day and I am still rooting for the time for him to not necessarily change it but to marry his passion for the craft and his passion for the audience in such a way that he said I'll be whatever you want me to be and I would love for him to feel full permission to be the actor-artist that would want to tell the stories that are deeply personal like apparently my name is con is so personal and I don't think it's a coincidence that that is so artistically excellent that it's coming from such a personal space for him and that's my hope is that he will he will hear and get the love and the acceptance and the resonance from fans because he wants to please them to to do the things that aren't just you know he said I'll dance for you I'll be the clown for you, I'll be the romance for you I would love for them all to say be Shahrukh Khan for us the Shahrukh Khan we haven't seen the Shahrukh Khan who wants to put all of himself out there with his craft in ways we haven't even seen before with no other thing but the abandonment of self in the pursuit of his highest artistic self that would cause everyone to I think Marvel because I think he's an exceptionally good actor and he's also an exceptionally great entertainer yeah he is and I would love that too but I don't know that's ever going to happen I think it will I'm an optimist I'd love to talk to him about it I think that's one of the issues you fall into with Shahrukh Khan is you want that side to come out of him because that's what you love obviously as opposed to what I've grown to start loving about Shahrukh Khan is what he said at the very end I serve reality with chocolate flavored popcorn that's exactly the one I was thinking of he does and a big fizzy soda on the side which is a what obviously you would do if you were obviously in his position or what I prefer to see on screen obviously I know that but it's something that I also love about Kieran Johar's cinema is that it's him to the fullest while also just pleasing the audience and having a good time will he might do a film we'll see what the combination is with Rashkimar Arani films because he usually blends those two pretty darn well in terms of commercial and this is going to be an interesting comparison but I have a similar frustration with the things I watched Sylvester Stallone do over his career because you think he's a better actor than I do though well and he's an extremely intelligent and articulate man an example he for years has always wanted to do something about it Edgar Allen Poe wrote it off because he said no one would accept that from me and I wish he hadn't done that to himself I wish he hadn't written off the parts of him because his best work is the part that was the most personal and the part that was the most artistically true which was Rocky and he also did a really good job in the very first First Blood which was not your stereotypical Rambo action film it was a drama so he I he gives everybody what they want and what they got was entertaining I just I feel like there's far far more not that he can't do the chocolate covered popcorn with the fizzy soda on the side but I would really love to see more I don't know that he cares though I don't think that's the right word but in terms of his prime goal is to make sure you're entertained as an audience specifically his audience I really wonder if what he was referring to about the silent moments and the emptiness that he can't pinpoint I wonder how much because he's such a complex he's a beautifully complex human being and knows it I wonder how much of the things that he has pursued and done and created of have been because there's clearly in there have been the fear of failing like his dad and the desire to succeed and the desire, it's a weird double edge because there's the fear of failing like dad but also wanting dad to be proud of his success it's evident with what he said about his dad is that he does not want to be a failure correct and if his dad was here I think he's doing all this because he wants his dad to be proud of him that's true but it's very clear that for his dad's success was a much deeper aspect than just what people would define as generic success that success to his dad was far more about personal aspects and I just truly do wonder I'm not trying to psychoanalyze it's what he said himself I wonder how much of that feeling and if he still has it today because this was 10 years ago if that emptiness that he himself admitted that is I wonder if that might be connected to and he might even agree and say it is but then again I don't know because he'll do that all the time he'll say something very definitive and then write on the heels of that but I'm not sure and it's a really beautiful attribute he's a really amazing person I don't know because obviously even if you do these elevative stuff that people that you can be proud of how many depressed actors are there it's just it's a depressing profession it's a wonderful profession but it's also very especially where he is lonely and a lot of careers don't go the way they wanted to even they were successes I don't think Daniel Day-Lewis is probably the happiest person out there no, Rainn Wilson wishes he could have appreciated the office more because he has admitted that during the run of the show he was just frustrated about why he wasn't becoming as big a name as Will Ferrell and Jack Black and even watching Steve Carell's career jump beyond the office he said here I was on one of the biggest shows and I didn't get to really appreciate it because I was frustrated every day on why isn't my career jumping off like all these other guys because he's not as good a vanilla guy but he missed he missed the opportunity in the moment I've seen him in other stuff, he's not as the talented actors as Steve Carell, very few are but the point isn't why didn't he make it the point is, isn't it sad he himself has admitted that he couldn't enjoy the success of that at the time but yeah I would say I want to talk with him but you could talk to this man for probably seven days straight and you would not have scratched the surface on everything you want to talk to him about we'll actually read his memoir sounds very interesting is it the one that Ana Pam Chopra wrote or is that a different thing? yeah I don't know, let us know but great interview, as always I don't think he's ever had a bad interview his best interview is yet to come because he hasn't had it with us yet I agree so we'll see in the future thank you so much to the stupid baby very much for everything of it let us know what other Shahrukh Khan and other interviews we can react to down below