The actor who redefined the standards of a mainstream hero, Irrfan shall live on in our memory for years and years to come
On April 29, 2020 the world woke up to the tragic news of globally renowned Bollywood actor Irrfan Khan’s death at the age of 53. The actor was admitted to a hospital in Mumbai due to a colon infection however the Piku-fame superstar lost the battle and the news of his passing away was revealed by his friend and director Shoojit Sircar on Twitter.
In March 2018, Irrfan was diagnosed with a rare and near-fatal kind of cancer — neuroendocrine tumour and spent most of the year in London under treatment for the condition. He returned to India in 2019 and started shooting his final film — Angrezi Medium, a sequel to his 2017 superhit Hindi Medium.
Starting out his career from the small screen, Irrfan appeared in several TV dramas in the nineties including Banegi Apni Baat while also taking up small roles in low-budget movies and international projects. However, his road to success was full of struggle and at one point he even contemplated retiring from the industry after a string of failed projects.
While actors like Salman Khan, Shahrukh Khan and Aamir Khan ruled Bollywood with their boy next door looks, Irrfan was not exactly the next traditional romantic hero Bollywood was looking for and had to work long and hard till he made his mark on the silver screen — and it took him nearly two decades to achieve that; but in the end it was all worth it.
While the small screen paid his bills, Irrfan wasn’t satisfied with the roles and believed it was holding back his creativity. He in fact did get to make his big screen debut in Mira Nair’s Oscar nominated Salaam Bombay! His role was unfortunately cut off from the final version of the movie.
“I am not ready to fit into the mould of commercial cinema,” he had once said and as destiny would have it, Irrfan ended up being one of the very few actors who blurred the lines between the two parallels of Bollywood at the time — massy cinema and metro cinema. While action and rom-com ruled the theatres, a new genre of movies was also finding appreciation from the new generation — the art movies were now being called meaningful cinema and Irrfan was leading the pack.
This journey again wasn’t easy, and the 90s saw Irrfan struggle with various unsuccessful films until London-based director Asif Kapadia offered him the lead role in his 2001 movie The Warrior. The movie made him a known face on the local and international platform and is said to have convinced the actor to not give up him his dream of the big screen.
Irrfan tasted his first success in Bollywood when he was cast in the critically acclaimed Maqbool, an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. The movie performed lukewarm at the box-office but garnered universal acclaim with critics praising Irrfan’s performance in the titular role.
Maqbool opened the doors of Bollywood to Irrfan, not the mainstream Bollywood with high-budget family dramas but the low-budget gritty stories that leading actors stayed away from. His ability to essay a variety of roles bagged him several character roles, each making him more prominent in the industry.
Winning him universal applause, Irrfan’s portrayal of a scary, fearless goon in 2003’s Haasil won him the Filmfare Best Villain Award.
His smaller yet impactful roles in multiple Hollywood projects can also be said to have contributed towards his success in becoming a leading Bollywood ‘anti-hero’ and soon in 2007 Irrfan won his first ever mainstream Filmfare Award for his supporting role in the movie Metro. The movie along with The Namesake was his two big hits in the year. In the following years; Irrfan was also seen in multiple international projects including A Mighty Heart also starring Angelina Jolie and Pakistani actor Adnan Siddiqui.
“People like to see my work, not face,” stated Irrfan who in 2008 starred in one of Hollywood’s greatest surprise hits Slumdog Millionaire. Directed by Danny Boyle, the movie went on to win the Best Picture Academy Award among several other accolades including the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture.
In 2009, Irrfan finally entered mainstream Bollywood in the movie New York starring John Abraham and Katrina Kaif. Playing a character role of a cop, Irrfan left a mark with his performance and in 2010 won the national award for his performance in the movie Paan Singh Tomar and also starred opposite Priyanka Chopra in 7 Khoon Maaf.
As Bollywood grew more towards story driven projects, a new wave of actors who would previously be untouchables were now getting mainstream recognition. One of the movies that contributed towards this change was The Lunchbox. Released in 2013 the movie won the Grand Rail d’Or at Cannes Film Festival and received a BAFTA nomination while also getting massive appreciation in India. He was also seen in the movie Piku opposite Deepika Padukone and Amitabh Bachchan.
“When you come out of the theatre and you don’t even talk about that film or remember it, then it disappoints me,” the actor once said and he did make sure that people kept talking about his movies and performances even after years. One such performance was in the 2017 comedy drama Hindi Medium.
The movie changed the cinema dynamics forever as Irrfan won several awards that year for the main lead including the main prize the Filmfare Award for Best Actor. Starring opposite Pakistan actor Saba Qamar, Irrfan’s onscreen presence and acting outshined every other actor that year and not only was the movie a critically acclaimed success but also met favourable box office results, becoming one of the biggest successes of the year.
Irrfan had finally won over the world of entertainment at 50. When actors think to retire, he had marked a new chapter in his life but as destiny would have it, after just an year his health started deteriorating and he was diagnosed with a rare type of cancer but he fought this battle and recovered. In 2019 he shot his final movie Angrezi Medium, sequel to Hindi Medium which was released in March 2020 just weeks before the world was locked down due to the coronavirus outbreak.
He passed away at the age of 53 from a colon infection; just a few days after his mother’s death — leaving behind a massive void that will forever remain unfilled.
Pakistani celebrities express grief and sorrow
Irrfan’s Pakistani co-stars Saba Qamar who played the role of his wife Meeta in the blockbuster movie Hindi Medium and Adnan Siddiqui who starred with him in the international project A Mighty Heart, expressed their sorrow over the actor’s passing away in emotional and heart-warming notes posted on social media.
Along with those who worked with him, many other actors who had been his fans were also deeply saddened by his untimely death and stars like Sajal Aly, Mahira Khan and Imran Abbas said their goodbyes.
