A rare film in today’s times that is being loved unanimously, there is so much to unpack in Karan Johar’s Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani, which puts in some strong messaging in a lighthearted manner. t2 chatted with the film’s writer Ishita Moitra (Shashank Khaitan and Sumit Roy are the other writers on the film) on the world of the film, its focus on romance across generations and its winning package of message and mirth.
So far, what’s the best thing that has been told to you about your writing in Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani?
Shabanaji (Azmi, who stars in the film) had brought Javed Akhtar saab for the cast and crew screening and he told me: ‘Aapko koi andaaza bhi nahin hain ki aapne kya kar diya hain.’ He told me that what worked was the social commentary that ran through the family drama. What has stood out is how we have tried to subvert the genre and yet keep it within the realm of mainstream entertainment. I had no words to express when he was telling me all this. I just went: ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you!’ (Laughs) I don’t think I sounded intelligent to him at all. He must have been thinking: ‘Kaise isne likh liya pata nahin’ (laughs).
The audience has appreciated the rebellious core of Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani, its shoutout to inclusivity and the spectrum of masculinity that we tried to showcase, especially through the character of Rocky (Ranveer Singh) who comes across as being brazen and macho but is actually so vulnerable and sensitive. The character of Chandan Chatterjee (played by Tota Roy Choudhury) manifests a different aspect of masculinity.
Also, what has also worked is the fact that almost everyone in the film starts off by being judgmental but by the time it ends, they all celebrate each other. That you can do only if you have empathy, compassion and love. I am glad that the viewer has picked up on and appreciated what we consciously worked towards.
What was the brief given to you?
The starting point was Karan (Johar, director), of course, because he had the idea of the story. The love story was his idea, that we would have a Punjabi family and a Bengali family in Delhi, all came from him. I am a Bengali from Delhi myself and I was very kicked about this aspect of the film (laughs). So Karan had a clear idea of what he wanted to do and then we got down to sketching the characters and situations. But honestly, the story of Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani is all him.
Along with Karan, you had Shashank Khaitan and Sumit Roy as co-writers. What was the collaborative process like?
We didn’t actually write together. One draft was written by Sumit and another by Shashank. I worked on Shashank’s draft and I wrote the screenplay and dialogues independently with Karan. So it wasn’t really a regular writers’ room situation where everyone was jamming together. The writing of this film was staggered over time and done independently. I mostly worked with Karan.
What were the most satisfying aspects of writing this film?
I am a very big Hindi film lover and I feel that Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani is a love letter to Hindi cinema. It’s not just about bringing back the songs, the chiffons and the lip sync... it is very meta in many ways. Like Dharamji (Dharmendra) singing Aaj mausam bada beimaan hain (from his own 1973 film Loafer). The film harks back to songs like Suno suno Miss Chatterjee (Baharen Phir Bhi Aayengi, 1966). If you love Hindi movies, there is so much to love in Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani. I just felt blessed to be part of something like this.
Of course, that also brought along many challenges. Like merging a rom-com and a family drama as well as certain messaging and looking for the most fun way of doing it so that it doesn’t end up being didactic at any point. We were very conscious of that.
Retro Hindi film songs were not only used as a backdrop but also functioned as a narrative device. What made you want to do that?
Karan was very clear that he wanted to do something like this. In films like Hum Aapke Hain Koun...! and DDLJ, there was an antakshari segment where they would bring in a nostalgic hook in the form of old Hindi film songs.
We don’t do that in our movies anymore. Over the last few years, I don’t think I see that kind of cinema happening here. Karan wanted to bring that back and make the viewer feel warm and fuzzy and he wanted our film to become a part of the larger narrative of Hindi films that have come and gone.
During our writing process together, Karan and I would think of so many songs, and listen to so many of them and the more we listened and wrote, the surer we became that it would work.
The use of an old love story (between Dharmendra and Shabana’s characters) to foreshadow/segue into a young romance (between Rocky and Rani, played by Ranveer and Alia Bhatt) has been done before. Love Aaj Kal is a prime example. When writing it, did you have apprehensions that the audience has seen something like this before and may not warm to it?
Again, this is how Karan wanted it to be. He wanted the Dharamji-Shabanaji track to not make an in-your-face statement, but when one watches it, one realises that it subtly talks about ageism and how, mostly, people can’t think of 70- or 80-year-olds having desire or the want for romance. Without any blatant commentary on it, we just wanted to put it out there in a very, very beautiful way.
Yes, it’s been done before. In Love Aaj Kal (2009), the two love stories kind of ran parallelly and cross-cut at points. I think it was done beautifully in Kabhi Kabhie (1976), but that has more drama than romance when they meet again. Rocky Aur Rani... is more rom-com than drama and we treated it like that.
Was there ever the apprehension that you were packing in too many things in one film? That it could end up being preachy...
We never wanted it to be preachy, our focus was on making it an entertaining film. The messaging had to come across in a sugarcoated, fun way. We spoke about cancel culture through a very fun monologue that Rocky delivers. We challenged how people are hellbent on adhering to predetermined gender roles by making the two men (Rocky and Chandan) do Dola re dola together. Everybody in the theatres is unanimously clapping in this sequence, and I feel so good!
Actually, I was a little apprehensive about how the audience would react when Chandan does Dhaai shaam rok le. I wondered if viewers would laugh at him or if they would feel bad for him. And now in the theatres, I see how sensitive the audience is, how people are feeling bad for him as he is ridiculed and it’s a vindication of sorts for me. Kudos to Tota for pulling it off so well.
The Chatterjees speak in a combination of Hindi and Bangla and break from one to another almost seamlessly. Was that a difficult aspect to master in the writing?
That’s how we speak at my home. I am not from Calcutta and though we predominantly speak Bangla at home, our vocabulary is a mix of Bangla, Hindi and English. Rani Chatterjee is also the same and she breaks from one language to another very unconsciously. Both Alia and Shabanaji put in so much effort to get their Bengali pronunciation right. Kudos to them because they had two Bengali actors (Tota and Churni Ganguly) sitting in front of them. They had a dialect coach and they worked hard on their Bangla every day and the results are there for everyone to see.
Which are your favourite scenes?
One is the cancel culture monologue, which was challenging to write and also very, very rewarding. The other is the confrontation between Rani and Rocky after Dhindora baje re during the Durga Puja celebrations. That was tricky to write because both of them are right in their own way and getting in the correct dose of drama was very necessary. Writing this whole film was like going to therapy for me.
I felt Jaya Bachchan’s Dhanlakshmi ended up being unidimensional. Would you agree?
We tried our best to justify it because, in the beginning, we showed how she was ill-treated by her mother-in-law when she got married and came into the house and many years later, the bitterness made her the same kind of person as her mother-in-law. Dhanlakshmi didn’t get any love and so she never gave any love to anyone else. In our heads, we have tried to explain it and I think she plays evil in a fun way in this film. And honestly, we didn’t want to redeem her and make her dance at the Rocky-Rani wedding in the end. Dhanlakshmi is not that kind of a person.
Priyanka Roy
