*Bollywood’s biggest icon Aamir Khan steps into his drawing room, rubbing sleep from his honey-brown eyes, you’re left wondering has he really turned a year older? *
His dishevelled, straight-out-of-bed look belies his age. Yes, Aamir turns 45 today and it would be rhetoric to add, the years don’t show. His last release 3 Idiots is the biggest hit in Bollywood film history; and, of course, the discerning actor is sitting pretty on a pile of both money and scripts. But what’s shocking is the fact that he has decided to sit his 45th year out as an actor.
Aamir has already announced his decision not to do a single film in this calender year. Instead, he will concentrate on releasing his banner’s three under production films — Peepli Live, Dhobi Ghat and Delhi Belly.
Seeing the slightly lost look in his eyes, one asks if it is, as they say, lonely at the top. To which the actor crinkles his eyes and says, “Lonely, no. I don’t look at life that way. I’m certainly not lonely, which might mean that I’m certainly not on the top. I’m very fortunate with the kind of relationships I have made with the people I have worked with. Today I feel more connected to my audience than ever before. So actually I’m neither alone nor am I lonely.”
His decision to not drive to the studios though is a conscious one. Says Aamir, “Professionally I have been giving so much of myself in the last three years. I ended up directing Taare Zameen Par; Ghajini and 3 Idiots were demanding both physically and mentally. I now feel the need to just stop and take a breath. I need to gather my energies again. My father’s (Tahir Hussain) sudden death came as a blow. I realised on that day how fragile life was. We take too much for granted. And, I have made up my mind to spend more time the next year with my children Junaid and Ira; my mother, with Faisal, with my sisters and my wife Kiran. This is what I would like to do. Time is moving. Relationships need to be nurtured. I will be working as a producer. That will hopefully be less consuming for me because the creative teams will do the major work. I will only be supporting them. I want to give value and importance to my personal life.”
There are also a number of things Aamir wants to start learning. “I want to learn to swim, I want to take cooking lessons from my mother. And I need to pick up some languages,” he says. “Over the years I have made a list of what I want to do outside of cinema And, I’m going to make a start now. Three or four of those targets must be achieved this year. I will start with learning Marathi. I can read and write it; but I don’t know how to speak Marathi. It is really shameful that I don’t speak my state language. On the other hand, I can speak my mother tongue Urdu. But I don’t know how to read and write Urdu. So this is my first priority. I’m not very good with languages. But I will start now. After which I will concentrate on my cooking and then swimming. So this year I will spend more time in the kitchen than in the studios