Size does matter! Keerti Reddy on Anil Kapoor's makeover in Badhaai Ho Badhaai

M D Riti

"Anil is such a thin person, that all of us were very eager to see how he would look as a fat man," laughs Keerti Reddy.

The vivacious star from Bangalore was talking about Anil Kapoor in his to-be-released Hindi film Badhaai Ho Badhaai. Keerti plays the role of Florence, a simple, kind-hearted girl. Kapoor--an extraordinarily obese man, falls in love with her. And so he decides he must shed his excess weight and win her love. This, in a nutshell, is the crux of the plot.

"Very plausible," says Reddy. "After all, we all know so many men who build up their muscles to impress their girl friends, right?"

However, what makes this particular role of Kapoor special is that he was made up every single day for one whole month by a special team of make up artistes from Los Angeles who specialise in the makeover department.

"The film is basically an entertainer" says Reddy. "It is not just a love story or triangle. It is a family story. Anil (Kapoor) and Satish Kaushik wanted to have something different in it. So they decided to make over Anil for the first part of the film."

Reddy is the only other lead star in the scenes featuring Kapoor as the fat guy. The director decided to shoot this segment in Delhi because the special make up required cold surroundings. Had they shot in Mumbai, the make up would simply have melted and run off Kapoor’s face.

"Anil showed tremendous patience. He had to wake up at 5 am every day to start his make up. It would take 5-6 hours to do the make up. The poor guy also had to eat his big meal of the day as soon as he woke up. He was not permitted to eat anything solid while he had the make up on. All he could do was drink fluids," admits Keerti.

The scenes were shot over a whole month from January 3 to February 3, 2002. "The make up was designed for Hollywood, where the weather can be controlled to much lower than Mumbai temperatures," points out Reddy.

The scenes had to be completed at a breakneck speed once Kapoor arrived on the sets that everyone had to be ready in advance. "I was given a bound script, and explained my specific scenes and dialogues the previous day itself," says Reddy.

"This whole process is just how they do it in Hollywood. It was like rehearsing for a play and then playing the parts perfectly at a given time. I used to rehearse like crazy, because I would really get it from my director if I fumbled."

As soon Kapoor arrived, they often shot straightaway without wasting time on rehearsals. Kapoor had to take great pains to see that he indulged in no facial contortions or grimaces that would make his make up crack.

"He was asked not to go overboard with expressions," says Reddy. "It called for tremendous dedication on his part. He had to put up with a lot of frustration, display infinite patience and also take care that all the rules did not affect his health in any way. Taking off the make-up took almost as much time as putting it on did."

"Initially, we were all worried about certain things," says Reddy now. "I cannot tell you just what before the film is released. Nor call I tell you just how they made his body look fat. Let me just say that the men from Los Angeles had a lot of things to do. When we saw the rushes, the scenes were all working well and so we were relieved and the rest of the days went off smoothly."

However Keerti is clueless about the footage the fat Anil Kapoor gets in the film. "I just know that there is quite a lot of it in the second half of the film," she says.

"Anil took the whole thing very well. He was excellent in comic sequences. I was so glad to be a part of this film. It was a wonderful learning experience for us all."

Her best memory of this strange month is of one particular day when some fans turned up on location to see AK in action. "They stood right next to him, and kept looking around asking, ` Anilji kahan hai?’," she recalls, laughing. "He was unrecognisable. He moved off some distance for something and my choreographer and I decided to play a trick on these people. Delhi is a star struck city and many people drift in to meet film stars at work. We walked upto them and said, "Please come tomorrow, he has scenes tomorrow and will certainly be here."

"They went away looking very disappointed. We had a good laugh".