Aamir interview on TOH,wage gap

There is a lot of conjecture around the movie being based on Philip Meadows Taylor's 1839 novel Confessions of a Thug.

Aamir negates it: "Thugs is a conventional, mainstream film which is essentially a revenge story. It's not based on any book and is not historically accurate to the Thuggy period. The movie is a work of fiction.

In an irony of sorts, for a man who shuns most awards, his first film Holi (in which he had a cameo) had won the National Award for cinematography. "Holi was before QSQT but it never released as a film. Most people saw it on TV because it won a National Award. The rule may be applicable today too. Any film which wins a national award has to be shown on Doordarshan. I wasn't playing a lead in that; I was one among 30 kids.

After QSQT came Raakh, an experimental film, the first among many such unconventional, off-mainstream choices. What makes Aamir this fearless? He disagrees. "It's not that I don't have fears. It's just that my fears don't stop me from doing what I want to do. They just make me more alert. I am aware that what I am doing is experimental and may not succeed; I was aware of the kind of challenges that lay ahead of us with Lagaan, Sarfarosh, Dil Chahta Hai, Rang De Basanti, Taare Zameen Par, and Dangal but creatively I wanted to go ahead so the fear never stops me from doing what I want. The fear keeps me on my toes.

"I am a very sentimental person. And I think I'm quite a romantic but that you'll have to ask Kiran that. The fact is that I love surprising her. I remember on her 40th birthday she wanted to celebrate with her family and friends; people she has known for years, those who were in college with her. So she wrote to all of them asking them to plan something for her 40th. I wrote to all of them separately and told them to make some excuse. All her friends wrote back to her with fancy excuses and they all copped out. Including her parents. Naturally, she was upset. I told her Azad and I will take her somewhere special. I knew she had always wanted to go to this one place in Assam. Without her knowing, I booked the place for 40-50 of her friends. So we flew in from Mumbai to Kolkata and then from Kolkata we were to fly to Guwahati. Now in the second leg of the journey I had chartered a plane and all her friends and family were already waiting in it. So when we took the connecting flight (for her it was a connecting flight from Kolkata), as she entered it was empty since everybody had ducked behind the seats. That's when they all jumped up and surprised her. We spent a few blissful days in Assam.

In our conversation Aamir talks about how he is hugely influenced by his mother, cousin Nuzhat, sisters Nikhat and Farhat, his first wife Reena and now Kiran--women who he says are strong and have inspired him in many ways. Our talk veers towards his children from his previous marriage (Junaid and Ira), who he believes are more like friends. "With Ira and Junaid, both of whom I'm close to, the relationship is not a typical father-child one but of friends. They rarely come to me for advice but sometimes Ira does. Yet she takes her own decisions and is quite confident about them.

Do they discuss everything? Boyfriend/girlfriend issues? "I think it's a beautiful feeling to fall in love and I think Ira is old enough to decide that for herself. She is 19 years old now. And my advice to both Junaid and her is that there should be love, trust, faith and honesty in any relationship; that is all that is needed.

Doesn't representation matter? The creator of Dangal and Secret Superstar (both films with feminist ideology) offers his perspective. "This may be the reality of today but the fact is that the reality of today is a result of the conditioning. We have been brought up with stories of male heroes. In children's stories, it is Chhota Bheem who is the hero; Motu-Patlu are the male protagonists. We are essentially a patriarchal society and that impacts how we represent women. It is very rarely that we show a girl as the lead who we look up to. The reason why the top 7-8 stars in the industry are all male is because our audience is conditioned by patriarchy to look up to male heroes. Let's build up women heroes and start it early. Change will not happen overnight.

So what is he like when angry? "I am quite patient so I don't get angry easily. When I do, I go silent. Suddenly there are steel walls around me. Nobody can get through to me.

How does he reboot and rid himself of anxieties? "I read. He shows me a copy of Amitabh Bagchi's Half the Night is Gone which he just finished. "And I backpack once a yearall alone without security, Man Friday, manager. Right from airport check-in to hotel check-in to cooking to washing clothes, buying stuff to eatI do it all by myself. As actors we are an indulged lot, these 2-3 weeks alone help me find myself. I sit in cafes, meet new people and do my own thing. It clears my head. Places I've visited are Iceland, Hawaii, and Buenos Aireswhere there are fewer Indians and less of a chance to be recognised.