Before stealing hearts and making history in Bollywood, Shah Rukh Khan starred in the television series Fauji in 1988. He played the role of Lt. Abhimanyu Rai, and the show followed the journey of a group of young men working their way through the military academy and surviving the perils of the battlefield. One of the actors from the show, Amina Shervani, who played Kiran Kochar, recently talked about how Shah Rukh was cast in the show and how it was actually his ‘bad looks’ that got him the part.
While appearing on the Kintu Parantu podcast, Amina talked about Fauji and what that show meant to her. She shared how Shah Rukh was never supposed to be in the show, but a conversation with his mother changed that. She recalled, “His mother had called me, Latif Fatima. She was an extremely nice lady, and she asked me whether there was a spot available for her son in Fauji. She said that her son is very handsome, and I told her that if her son is actually handsome, then he has no chance in Bollywood. People here want female stars to look beautiful all the time, but they want their male stars to look like monkeys and giraffes. If the star is handsome, then his career will go nowhere,” she said.
Amina added that Shah Rukh’s mother was relentless and, even after a lot of convincing, ended up sending Shah Rukh to the set. She said, “She didn’t listen to anything I said and still sent him to me. The moment I saw him, I called her back and said, ‘mubarak ho aapke bete ki shakal toh bilkul bandar jaisi hai‘ (congratulations! your son looks like a monkey), he will be a very successful hero. She was very angry at the comparison, but I explained to her that just like a monkey, his face is very expressive. I don’t think Shah Rukh is conventionally handsome or good-looking, but he is very expressive and has a very ‘elastic’ face.
Amina added that Shah Rukh was quick with his own reply and called her a monkey too, and complimented him further by saying, “Shah Rukh was a very talented actor even before Fauji. He had done theatre, and that too with people like Barry John. Kids who come from theatre are always talented, and he was very versatile as an actor. Just look at his career.” Fauji was the foundation of one of the greatest careers in Bollywood to date, as King Khan went on to become a global icon. The expressive ‘monkey’ face has starred in some of the most well-known Bollywood films of the 21st century and featured alongside the biggest artists in the world during a career spanning almost 30 years.
