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Akshaye Khanna: New stardom has been a long time coming

It is Akshaye Khannas year, and we are just bidding adieu to it. Scroll through social media, and every second reel is of the actor, lording over the frame, grooving to the catchy beats of FA9LA , the song by Bahrain-based rapper Flipperachi, used in the blockbuster Dhurandhar. Akshaye plays Pakistani gangster Rehman Dakait, and with his intense stare and a Marlon Brando-coded dialogue delivery, shines the brightest in a multi-starrer. Rewind to the beginning of the year, and you have him playing a kohl-eyed Aurangzeb in Chaava. Its a tricky one. Mughal emperors in the current cinema are being reduced to temple-demolishing, chicken-leg-tearing beasts. Akshaye, however, holds his own. His Aurangzeb is less plain vile and more calculative, and he plays him with a silent depth, portraying the highly debated-on emperor with a necessary roundedness. But amidst all the adulation coming his way, Akshaye, reportedly, is off at his Alibaug home, away from the bustle of Mumbai. Akshaye is a famous recluse, with no over-enthusiastic PR or social media presence. His interviews are few, and in most of them, he is reserved but real. A 2019 actors roundtable has Akshaye being amazed and awkward as other panelists, including Ranveer Singh and Ayushmann Khurrana, reminisce and laud his performances. An old interview has him being content with himself when asked about his marriage prospects (Having a wife, a child, a family, is the biggest responsibility for a man. I am happy, alone. No responsibility. Fantastic life I have got here). Another has him schooling a journalist when asked if he feels sidelined because he never became a superstar. If I were a businessman with a `500 crore business, am I not successful? Will I only be considered a success if I am equal to a Tata or an Ambani? he retorts. In a country of 120-crore people, where only 15-20 get to be the leading man, I am one. What more would anybody want? Akshaye Khanna was born in 1975 to actor and fashion icon Vinod Khanna and Geetanjali Talyarkhan. He also has an older brother, the dreamy-looking Rahul Khanna. Akshaye had a lukewarm debut with Himalay Putra (1997), a melodramatic tale of a young mans quest to find his father. A more artsy extension to this daddy issuerole was in the 2007 film Gandhi, My Father, where he plays Harilal Gandhi, the disgruntled, eldest son of the Nations father. In a harrowing scene from the film, Akshaye, in tattered clothes, is the sole person shouting Mata Kasturba ki jai amidst a crowd chanting Gandhis praise. Akshaye might have received his first big award for the role of a baby-faced soldier in Border (1997), but he showcased his acting chops for the first time in the 1999 Subhash Ghai musical Taal. He plays a boy, besotted by Aishwarya Rais beauty. His unrequited lover comes-ofage at the start of the millennium in Farhan Akhtars directorial debut, Dil Chahta Hai (2001), a cult favourite in which he essayed the role of a reserved painter Siddharth, who falls for the simplicity of Dimple Kapadias Tara, an alcoholic, divorced, older woman. If Aamirs Aakash in the film was all about going after your love, Akshayes Sid taught a generation the romance of letting go. It might have started with lover boys, but he quickly branched out. The year immediately after Dil Chahta Hai, you see him portraying a scheming hustler in Humraaz (2002), an Abbas-Mustan thriller also starring Bobby Deol, another dependable actor, recently catapulted to widespread acclaim. There is a pulpy enjoyment in watching Akshaye in Race (2008) as a jealous younger sibling crossing and being doublecrossed by the all-knowing, big brother Saif Ali Khan. But its not just the good or bad guys, Akshaye also possesses the ability to surpass the subtle and go a pitch louder as a theatrically funny Priyadarshan character. Hungamas (2003) Jeetu (from Videocon) is a millennial classic, and so is Jai Chand from Hulchul (2004). Another of his over-the-top characters is the Oscar-seeking Aatish Kapoor in the Gen Z-favourite brainrot film Tees Maar Khan (2010). Akshaye can also quickly switch the serious back on when playing cops or investigators. Watch his kitschy, Hercule Poirot-act in the mystery-comedy 36 China Town (2006). There is also Ittefaq, where he plays an astute cop. He proves a worthy replacement of a powerhouse actor like Tabu for Drishyam 2, where he plays a cop, matching wits with Ajay Devgns Vijay Salgaonkar. While his initial performances showed him as an actor not desperate for attention, he now silently commands it. When he is on screen, the camera is transfixed with him and mesmerised by him. The audience hangs onto each word of Rehman Dakait. In Dhurandhar, spoiler alert, when the gangster is in his final moments, you never see him die. His last visual is from Ranveers covert-spy Hamzas viewpoint. He is seen sitting, staring, smoking away in a dream sequence. Dakait might be dead, but Akshaye Khanna is here to stay.

21 Dec 2025 7:56 am