How Mumbai's Naaz theatre became a hotspot for Bollywood films

This is quintessential story of Bollywood today: the passing of the old-world order to make way for the new-fangled experience of movie-watching. And it can be told through the closure of the grand old cinema - Naaz - on south Mumbai's Lamington Road. Not just the art-deco cinema interiors, but also rows of nearly 80 trade offices where fortunes were made and unmade for over half a century have been sealed by the city's municipal authorities.
The hub of show business has been locked in controversy for almost a decade now. The cinema itself had packed up a while ago and has been wasting. The last stroke was the recent closure of the offices, where, among scores of others, the business workplaces inherited by the families of the late G.P. Sippy (producer of Sholay, 1975) and the late N.N. Sippy (who masterminded such memorable mystery thrillers as Woh Kaun Thi?, 1964, and Gumnaam, 1965), buzzed around the clock, 24x7. In addition, the unfussy café, where traders would tuck into quick omelette meals, is no more. Gone too is the chaat stall, reputed for its potato-stuffed samosas, spicy flour pancakes and tamarind chutney.
So what did Mumbai's civic fathers have against Naaz, anyway? The answer is a debt of over INR4 crore (approximately Dh2.4 million), which has been pending. The sum is piffling in terms of the real estate value commanded by the cinema complex. The owner of Naaz, R.P. Anand, however, is in no mood to pay up or to sort out the impasse.
A sprawling section of the property was bought in the early 1950s by Anand, who is in his mid-80s now. Bedridden, he answers my phone call to say words to the effect of que sera sera. He points out that his parents had moved from Lahore to Karol Bagh in Delhi during the partition of the subcontinent. Next: an amazing twist of fortune. A casually purchased lottery ticket led to a jackpot win, circa 1953. With this windfall, the Anands began financing films and shifted to Mumbai, where they established the Naaz cinema. One of the first films to be premiered here was the Nasir Hussain-directed Tumsa Nahin Dekha (1957), a surprise musical hit, during the black-and-white era, that established Shammi Kapoor as an A-list star.
Rated a 'lucky' cinema ever since, Naaz became a prime choice for the showcasing of big-ticket movies starring Dilip Kumar, Raj, Shammi and Shashi Kapoor, and Dev Anand. Simultaneously, the cinema wasn't averse to showing distinctly offbeat films, like K.A. Abbas's Char Dil Char Rahen (1959), Hrishikesh Mukherjee's Anuradha (1960) and Asit Sen's Anokhi Raat (1968).
The interiors of the auditorium were sculpted with banner logos of film production companies of V. Shantaram and Mehboob Khan. Plaster-of-Paris cherubims and a trumpet-tooting angel adorned the mirror-lined foyer. Families, accompanied by a 'lady', were permitted to book 'boxes', as at an opera theatre, for an outing at the movies. This quaint form of seating survived right to the end. Moreover, in a first of its kind, the management had organised a creche where trained attendants would babysit infants and restless tots. Needless to ask, "Who does this any more?"
The downcurve began in the 1990s. By the time the multiplexes arrived towards the latter-years of the decade, the show was clearly over for the Naaz. Single-screen cinemas were avoided by filmgoers for the enhanced luxury and brighter projection facilities at the new chain of cinemas that mushroomed all over the city and its suburbs.
It hardly mattered that ticket rates at the 'plexes shot through the roof and a tub of popcorn cost as much, if not more, than the price of admission. Single-screeners, especially on Lamington Road, shut shop. If anyone regretted the demise of Swastik, Novelty, Apsara and Minerva on the hallowed road of cinemas, it was only the nostalgia-philes lamenting the loss of cinema heritage. Barely 20 single screens from the 200-plus in the city have survived in some semblance of shape.
On its last legs, Naaz screened only re-reruns of action-packed films of Amitabh Bachchan, Dharmendra, Mithun Chakraborty and Govinda. The rush for the new releases had shifted inexorably to the 'plexes.
The maintenance of single-screen cinemas deteriorated. Those who still continued to come here were there not for the film, but for three hours of airconditioning during the hot summer months. Since electricity bills exceeded way beyond ticket sales, the airconditioning would often be switched off under the guise of 'power cuts'.
The two sons of R.P. Anand weren't accessible. The patriarch said they were "out of town". To the question whether Naaz could still be saved, restored and re-opened, he sighs, "See, whenever my health permits me, I still go and look at the place in the afternoons. It was the city's dream cinema. But, then dreams have to end, don't they?"
wknd@khaleejtimes.com