The interview which appears below, was originally published on The Hindu in June 2002. ©The rights to this material are reserved to the owner. If you have any concerns or comments, please send an email to info@rahmaniac.com.
It is not often that you encounter A.R. Rahman on the suburban train. But in the bustling metropolis that is London, you just might catch sight of him as he takes the tube from Holburn to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s office near Leicester Square. You just might.
Just days before the premiere of his first Western musical, Bombay Dreams, Rahman is rushing from one interview to the other and talking to people, most of whom are waiting to see whether Sir Andrew’s new find from India would set a new rhythm to the essential West End musical. Can this diminutive, self-effacing man do it?
In a few days, they will know. And judge the man who truly believes what he is today “because God looked at him”.
With Bombay Dreams slotted to open on June 19, Rahman lingers for 20-odd minutes talking to this correspondent about what it means to him. Even as he walks into Sir Andrew’s office, you can see the difference. In the place of that shy retirement so characteristic of him, there is now a friendly, ebullient, charming man. The only explanation is that he wears his “London personality”.
“Circumstances force you to make some changes. This one works here,” he says casually. But of course, he wouldn’t want to change completely, he adds, ensuring that you know that “there are certain things I do not want to change”. As if by way of explanation, he says, “In Madras, I am working constantly nearly 20 hours every day. It is different here. My time and energies are exclusively for Bombay Dreams.” The sole reason he has traveled to London nearly 15 times in the last three years.
Ever since December 1999, when Sir Andrew popped the question, Rahman has been pondering scores for his first West End musical a story about a poor boy who comes to Bombay to make it big in Bollywood. It is a milestone of sorts for him and a musical seems to be the perfect bridge to moving further on. “I am always thinking about how further you can go in music. In India, every film has five songs. Which is great, but also not so good. I want to move ahead and do something more exciting. But if I go to Hollywood, where I will be doing background scores, it will not mean anything. Well, it does mean money, but… songs do have an effect on people.”
That way, Bombay Dreams has helped him straddle the East and the West and build a bridge between the two. There are 19 songs in the musical, some of them familiar to those who have seen Tamil/Hindi movies. ‘Shakalaka Baby’, ‘Chaiya Chaiya’, ‘Ooh La La’ are among them.
Does that not inhibit him as a creator from making his debut in a new genre? “Not really. To a western ear, I am/was a nobody. What got me here were my film songs. That particular me is very important for them, so the songs must be there. Besides, it is authentic because the musical is set in Bombay.” However, 70 percent of the scores are new, including the haunting theme song.
Rahman is also thrilled about working in a “whole new medium”. In a play, things are fluid. You set the mix and then, after you see the whole play, you will have to chop some sequences and possibly add others. So the attitude has to be liquid, rather than firm, he says, “certainly different from the controlled experiments that are possible within the confines of a studio”.
This also meant that he had to perforce get out of the industry that he was in, taking off and mentally and physically, casting himself in different settings and interacting with other members of the play. He had to say goodbye to those intense closed-door composing sessions that have become legendary. This time around, he was at the rehearsals “nearly 75 percent of the time”, interacting with the rest of the cast and the crew, something he has hitherto cared little for.
However, it was a new experience to see people performing live every day and, as he explains in a completely Indian metaphor, “It is like watching a pirated video at home and watching a 70-mm movie in a theatre. You are watching the real thing.”
Veering back to that bit about building bridges, the way Rahman perceives it, the bridge he is building will open up new vistas for other music directors from India, where according to him there is “plenty of talent”. “If somebody gets somewhere, he finds a path… builds a bridge. It is not only me. If this works out, it is an opportunity for contemporary Indian music on the whole.”
As far as personal triumphs go, where does he think he will go from here? The answer is disarmingly simple. “I don’t know. I have never thought about it. I am happy to finish today’s job. Whatever we are doing now is exciting for me.” All the more exciting, since the reactions to the preview shows, have been quite encouraging.
“So far it has been a very good musical. We intend though to make it a great musical!” Among those impressed with the first few shows were his wife and little daughter who flew to London to catch a preview before the child goes back to school.
The cross-section of the London audience that has so far seen the preview has given good vibes. Also, for the first time in his life, there were Westerners queuing up for his autograph people who were hearing him for the first time. “That was fun,” he says. And then gets non-committal as the conversation veers to his Hollywood offers.
Are the rumours true? It does seem they are, because Rahman does admit that there are a “couple of offers from Columbia Pictures”, though he hastens to add, “Nothing has been worked out yet, it is very early to tell”. Then of course, comes that quintessential Rahman statement, that is so simple and yet so believable, “I don’t worry about what is in store for tomorrow. That way, I can sleep.”
Sleep well, then, and dream the Bombay Dreams.
