Some will watch In Which Annie Gives It Those Ones (1989), which made it to theatres on March 13, to see author Arundhati Roy’s brush with acting. Others, to see Shah Rukh Khan in his pre-stardom era, as he appears in a brief role in Pradip Krishen’s directorial feature. While making the film in the late ’80s, had Krishen anticipated that Khan would go on to become a superstar?

Pradip Krishen

“I didn’t expect Shah Rukh Khan to become as big a star as he did. When you have a bunch of young students working with you, you don’t quite imagine that one of them will become a megastar. I’m happy for him,” shared Krishen. He added that Khan was “unhappy” about not getting a meaty role in the movie. “After he became a star, he said some unkind things about us. He said, ‘Those guys never recognised what a good actor I am.’ I guess that’s true. But he belongs to a genre of acting that didn’t suit the parts we were looking for.”

Arundhati Roy in the film

Last month, the movie was screened at the Berlin International Film Festival. Lead actor and writer Roy dropped out of the gala, criticising festival jury president Wim Wenders’s statement that filmmakers should stay out of politics. We asked Krishen if he too considered withdrawing from the gala. “I was already in Doha when I learnt that Arundhati wasn’t coming. It was too late for me to bail out. I admire her courage to stand for her principles. The audience clapped when I said she had made this decision on principle.”