QAMYAB – THE FORGOTTEN GEMS OF BOLLYWOOD
Qamyab is our humble tribute to all those lesser-known actors, one hit wonders and junior artists who we see umpteen times but don’t know about; beyond their faces. These actors have been an integral part of Bollywood but didn’t get their due. This series is our sincere attempt to put a name to these faces, familiarize them to our readers and celebrate their achievements in life – however big or small. We believe that every artist contributes in his/her own way to the cinema’s success. Qamyab will explore the unknown lives of such actors and artists as we believe even these forgotten gems of Bollywood deserve their due recognition today.
Nowadays, ‘Nepo-kid’ is the oft used (and abused) term to describe a son or daughter of a celebrity debuting in Bollywood. But all these star kids don’t emerge out to be as successful like their parents. If nepotism indeed mattered so much, every child of the yesteryear stars would have had a successful career. We have seen what happened to Kumar Gaurav and Tusshar Kapoor, to name just two. There are many such cases.
In the early ’90s, a son of famous film director and stage actor had no real intention of becoming an actor but ended up being a part of Bollywood and made his mark in one critically acclaimed movie. His onscreen name was Commando Peter D’Souza for which he is remembered even today. This actor is Gautam Joglekar. We hope our readers have connected the two names and recollect him now.
Gautam Joglekar played the lead opposite Madhuri Dixit in Prahaar (1991), directed by Nana Patelar co-starring himself and Dimple Kapadia. However, not much is known about him after this film. So, what happened to Gautam Joglekar or Commando Peter of Prahaar. Let’s find out…
Gautam Joglekar was born on 26th December, 1966 in Pune to talented parents – Arun Joglekar and Sai Paranjape. Arun Joglekar was a well-known Marathi stage artist while Sai Paranjape is famously known to direct the classic Hindi comedies Chashme Baddoor (1981) and Katha (1982).
Gautam and his actress sister Winnie Paranjape spent their childhood with their grandmother as both their parents were busy in their respective career and spend most of their time in Delhi for plays and workshops.
In those days, Arun Joglekar was a close friend of actor Amol Palekar, cinematographer Debu Deodhar and then upcoming actor Nana Patekar. When Gautam was studying in tenth standard, he started living in Amol Palekar’s home as Arun would be travelling frequently and didn’t have a permanent accommodation. It is during this time Amol Palekar was making the controversial film Akriet (1981) based on the Manwat murders and the teenaged Gautam Joglekar made his debut in this film by playing one of his sons.
Gautam never wanted to be an actor as he had seen his father struggle for work. But his mother Sai, who was an acclaimed director, wanted him to learn the technicalities of filmmaking after completing his education. Gautam did his HSC from the prestigious Fergusson College in Pune and wanted to enter Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) for the course of cinematographer. But the same year, FTII made graduation compulsory for the course and thus by default, he had to complete his studies.
After his graduation, Gautam enrolled into the course and started assisting Debu Deodhar and continued to work with him for six years. In 1990, Amol Palekar was making the musical drama Thodasa Roomani Ho Jayen with Nana Patekar and Anita Kanwar as the main leads and Debu Deodhar as the cinematographer. All three friends of his father were working in the same movie and no surprise, Gautam got a chance to appear in a small role in it, thus making his actual debut as an adult.
Once after the days shoot of Thodasa Roomani Ho Jayen, everyone was partying hard and after a few drinks, there was some exchange of words between Gautam and Amol Palekar. Nana Patekar noticed this and when Gautam dropped him home that night, Nana suddenly hugged him and declared that you are the hero of my directorial debut called Prahaar (1991).
Gautam was left blank faced after hearing this from Nana and at first, he felt the senior actor was joking. Gautam didn’t know much about Prahaar except that Madhuri Dixit was playing the lead opposite him.
Coincidentally, Arun Joglekar was initially signed to play the character of Mr. D’Souza, reel life father of Gautam’s character Peter but had to be replaced by Habib Tanvir after his death. When Gautam Joglekar signed Prahaar, many analysts and industry bigwigs told Nana Patekar not to cast him as the hero opposite Madhuri Dixit as he didn’t have good looks but Nana was confident about his choice.
To prepare for his role of an army cadet, Gautam along with his co-actors Vishwajeet Pradhan, Shivkumar Subramaniam and few others and Nana Patekar himself, had an extensive forty days commando training at Belgaum Military school.
Prahaar focused on the life of Peter D’Souza, a middle class Catholic boy from Bandra whose family runs a small bakery. Peter joins the Indian Army soon after his engagement to Shirley (Madhuri) against her wishes. He is trained under strict Major Chouhan (Nana) and wants to quit midway but eventually, emerges to be successful commando. Unfortunately, destiny has other plans for him. Gautam considers Prahaar as a milestone in his career and rightly so!! It is all the more special for him as he got to romance the lovely Madhuri Dixit and even had a lovely romantic number with her ‘ ‘Dhadkan zara ruk gayi hai’.
Prahaar wasn’t a commercial success but got high critical acclaim. Gautam’s character of Commando Peter D’Souza made a place in everyone’s heart. But surprisingly, he didn’t pursue acting after this and instead chose to stay behind the camera like his mother Sai Paranjape.
Around that time, Gautam decided to direct a TV serial Satyarushi Saraaswari with Jaya Bachchan for then newly launched channel BI TV. Unfortunately, the channel got shut suddenly and his serial was in limbo. Few years later, he directed the episode Gubbare for Zee TV’s Rishtey (1998).
In 2005, Gautam Joglekar made his Marathi directorial debut with the horror comedy Pak Pak Pakaak starring newcomers Narayani Shastri, child artist Saksham Kulkarni and above all Nana Patekar in his Marathi comeback as an actor. Interestingly, Nana had directed Gautam earlier in Prahaar while Gautam directed him in Pak Pak Pakaak. The film became a box office hit and encouraged Gautam to continue with direction.
Gautam directed his next Marathi film Aai No 1 (2005) with big names like Ashok Saraf, Rasika Joshi, Sanjay Narvekar and Madhura Velankar but this film bombed at the box office. Gautam blamed himself for the movie’s failure as he felt the success of Pak Pak Pakaak overwhelmed his creativity. He faced huge losses due to this movie and ended up dissolving his production house.
Many years later, Gautam Joglekar decided to make a comeback to direction and started working on his next film Jai Jai Maharashtra Majha (2012). Sadly, he encountered many hurdles while making this movie. He faced a lot of negativity from certain industry folks, who were hell bent on badmouthing it and preventing its release. Gautam braved all the odds against him and ensured a decent release for his dream project but unfortunately, the patriotic title turned misleading for the audience and they gave it a miss. The movie plot actually revolved around a girl from Maharashtra adopted by parents from America and years later, she returns to her state to experience its lovely people and culture.
After the Jai Jai Maharashtra Majha debacle, Gautam decided to quit the industry but before this, he was seen in successful Marathi films like Dombivli Fast (2005) and Fakt Ladh Mahna (2011).
Gautam was married to television actress Moon Moon Bannerjee, which ended within a few months. He found love again in artist Shilpa coincidentally whose last name is also Joglekar and is often mistaken to be his wife.
Shilpa would travel to Europe for her workshops and Gautam started assisting her where he would do all the work of wood cutting required for the workshop. He travelled with her for almost five years but at one point, gave it all up. But that experience of assisting Shilpa developed the skills of carpentry in him.
In 2015, Gautam returned back to acting with the TV serial Asa Sasar Surekh Bai as the arrogant Mr. Inamdar. His producer friend offered him the role casually and Gautam accepted it as he got a chance to play father to three daughters and he always wished a daughter in real life. This started his second innings as an actor and he worked in serials like Radha Prem Rang Rangli (2017), Majya Navryachi Baiko (2016), etc.
Gautam Joglekar currently spends most of his time at his Pali farm house in Maharashtra and enjoys his new hobby of carpentry. He returns back to the camera whenever work comes knocking on his door.
After Prahaar, Gautam was seen in a few Hindi films like 200 Halla Ho (2021) and the very recent Ayushmann Khurrana starrer An Action Hero (2022), where he played an underworld don based on a real-life character.
We hope our readers have enjoyed this article on Gautam Joglekar aka Peter of Prahaar and the persistent question about where he was all these years has finally been answered.
All images courtesy Internet
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