Karan Johar is no stranger to controversies. It’s not all bad though, for the director has not held back on his love for the limelight. In a recent opinion piece for NDTV, Johar tells us more than we need to know about the various things he does in his goal to get more and more attention.
“I find myself telling my PR person that she slip this or that titbit out. Add it all up, and I am an attention-seeker. And proud of it! The things I do.”
That’s not necessarily a bad thing, really.
Only, towards the end, he uses this attention-grabbing personality of his as a sort of excuse for that hostage video of his.
“I am not a hound, I am an attention-seeker. Very different animal. My kind of attention requires greater finesse.
Or being threatened by a political party. That gets you attention. It’s not my favourite kind, but there it is.”
Not too long ago, when the audience were all still streaming Bulleya on their phones, and Aishwarya Rai was everything, Johar found himself in the hot seat.
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For Fawad Khan, of all people.
And so, as demands for Fawad’s axing from Ae Dil Hai Mushkil began, Johar was allegedly ‘forced to’ prove his nationalism, through an awkward video.
As the debate moved on to one about the filmmaker’s right to free speech, Johar’s ADHM was ‘allowed’ to release.
Now that the film is finally out of the theatres, canny Johar has finally seen fit to explain the reason behind the video. In an effort to buy back the credibility he lost (by giving in to the MNS’ demands) Johar offered a milksop of a statement that said nothing, and hinted at absolutely nothing.
Like this gem of a line:
“And then you realise what you should have always known: the trouble with being in the limelight all the time is it can blind you, even briefly, so you forget the darkness around it.”
So, for Johar, his eternal inability to not stay out of the limelight, meant that he did not think about the kind of horrors that waited outside it.
So it’s not Johar’s fault he didn’t head off MNS’ many attempts to shake him down. It’s the spotlight’s.
It’s not Johar’s fault that he set a precedent, the sort of thing that means Sanjay Leela Bhansali can get harassed the way he is. It’s not Johar’s fault that he can’t say those three words. And it’s fine.
What’s not fine, is that he was not strong enough, confident enough in his work and his ‘morality’ to keep fighting on.
An admission of guilt, four months late, does not absolve Johar.
Instead, it only makes him guiltier.