Feb 24, 2007 03:24 PM
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I’ve been jumping all over the place, screaming ‘Me!Me!’ each time a deep, baritone in the T.V Promo asks ‘Kaun Banega Crorepati?’ but does anybody ever listen to me? Not.
So, after a futile 2 months of trying to get their attention by the abovementioned act bad-knee et all, I settled to watch the curtain finally being raised on Shahrukh Khan asking us the question Mr Amitabh Bachchan’s refined tone has been asking for the past 2 seasons.
In between peeling luscious, red carrots to make Gajar Halwa, I watched a jittery, very-conscious and hamming-true-to-his-style King Khan make a complete fool of himself in the 3rd season of Kaun Banega Crorepati, or KBC as it is more popularly known as.
Attired in a very insipid, charcoal-grey suit and sky-blue tie, a rather haggard looking Shahrukh Khan inaugurated the episode by making a subtle bitchy dig at his predecessor and the ‘shudh Hindi’ being used on the show so far.
Khan then rapped in Bengali for the 1st contestant, spoke a smattering of Telegu for the 2nd, addressed the computer as ‘Compaq-da’ and ‘computer-gaaru’, slapped a high-five after every question, spoke gibberish, abbreviated the contestants names in an attempt to be cute, massaged anothers shoulder and if all this wasn’t more than enough, he repeatedly hugged the bejaysus out of the gobsmacked contestants! Shahrukh did everything he could to play to the gallery. Everything that he shouldn’t have.
His determination to turn around the style of the show is obvious. Amitabh Bachchan’s trademark endearing words have been replaced by absurd ones, for eg; ‘Lock-kiya jai?’ is now ‘freeze kar do’. ‘Confident?’ is now something really obnoxious like ‘kaccha-kaccha, pakka-pakka’. ‘Computerji’ is now ‘Mr Computer/Compaq’. ‘Bhaiyyon aur bheno’ is now ‘girls and boys’ and ‘I want to quit’ is, hold your breath, ‘Shahrukh mujhe gale laga lo’(wt…?! not on your life, man!)
The new ‘KBC’ sorely lacks the class, intelligence and elegance Mr Bachchan brought to the show with his own inimitable style. I loved being enlightened by the ‘shudh-hindi’ and the ‘muhavaras’ that he quoted and simply adored the way he put the contestants at ease and his very gracious sense of humor.
Ham Khan on the other hand, brings his nervous energy on to the screen, which in turn rubs off on the contestants making them uneasy and gets them to either behave over-enthusiastically or just sober down completely.
No, Shahrukh Khan doesn’t work for me.
Is it too early to say? Maybe, yes. After all, filling in the illustrious shoes of a living legend can’t be easy, no matter what.
Ho-hum!
Off I go to make the Gajar ka Halwa. Kuch meetha ho jaaye! Wink
