Netflix is calling its new docuseries The Romantics a celebration of the ‘life and legacy of Bollywood filmmaking titan Yash Chopra’, but it is his elusive elder son Aditya Chopra — the scion of Yash Raj Films, which is celebrating its 50th year — whom director Smriti Mundhra has pulled out of the shadows and put under the spotlight.
Having shielded himself from the media since his blockbuster directorial debut Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge in 1995, Aditya has, for the first time in all these years, agreed to face the camera to talk about himself, his illustrious father, his passion and his journey.
And it is such an incredible feat to pull off that even his close friends actors Abhishek Bachchan and Hrithik Roshan brushed aside Mundhra when she claimed she had got Aditya talking.
Several other actors either raised their eyebrows in disbelief or were shocked by the possibility of an appearance. Kajol called him ‘grumpy’ and Abhishek Bachchan summed up the public sentiment when he said, ‘Aditya Chopra is a rumour. He doesn’t exist.’
So, to The Romantics goes the credit of establishing that not only does Aditya Chopra exist, he’s an eminently affable and articulate person to boot. Apart from being the man who resuscitated Yash Raj Films with DDLJ, revitalised it with Dhoom and now has rocketed it to a whole new level with Pathaan.
The docuseries is structured to begin as a tease, slowly building up to the big moment. The first episode is the origin story of Yash Raj Films, which ends with an empty chair and a joke on the invisible but omnipresent Aditya. And then comes the big reveal — the mythical man shows up in person. He’s dressed in a white shirt and blue jeans, matching his white moustache, seated comfortably in a chair.
In the first few moments, Aditya comes across as relaxed and easy-going. The proverbial reticent man then opens up, reminisces, smiles, meanders, laughs, takes a moment to collect himself. Extremely eloquent, self-introspective and rooted. He calls himself a ‘rich kid’ who was willing to take risks whereas his father Yash Chopra, a man from Jalandhar, made it on his own from scratch. With archival photographs and video clips capturing his growing up years under the shadow of his father’s filmmaking career, The Romantics stitches together Aditya’s life since he was a kid, with rare insights from his industry colleagues.
One of the most interesting tidbits about Aditya is that as a kid he would beat Hrithik Roshan in dance competitions at birthday parties. He was also quite the ‘tyrant’ whom Karan Johar wasn’t too fond of while growing up, but his personality was such that he had ‘fans’ around him at parties.
In the last episode of The Romantics, Aditya expresses his concern about not being a ‘people person’ like his father. That will hardly be a concern after this docuseries.
