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“I suppose in the end, the whole of life becomes an act of letting go, but what always hurts the most is not taking a moment to say goodbye.”
― Yann Martel, Life of Pi
In a career spanning almost three decades, Irrfan Khan (1967-2020) managed to encapsulate the entirety of the human experience in his characters. This morning, as the world woke up to the devastating news of his untimely goodbye, we couldn’t help but think about him and about what he meant to us.
All along, we felt at home with the parts he brought to life as he managed to make a hero out of the ordinary and a story out of the everyday. Filmmaker Mira Nair, who cast him in her 1988 directorial Salaam Bombay! was probably one of the first people to recognise Irrfan for the man and the actor he was. Business Today quotes, “while talking to the writer Anees Chabra for his book on Irrfan Khan titled, “The Man, The Dreamer, The Star”, Nair said, “I noticed his focus, his intensity, his very remarkable look, his hooded eyes. I clocked him”.” She said that he could tell by looking at her face if she was happy or not with a shot, and it is in this sensitivity that lies his success.
Irrfan Khan was an actor who understood that in order to truly add life to a character, he had to listen, observe, feel, and then emulate. His wife has reportedly been found saying that upon coming back from work, he used to immerse himself in the study of books and characters. Long after success, he practised till late in the night. A believer in the fact that uncertainty is the only constant, Irrfan made every character memorable and always relatable by perhaps becoming a little bit of it and a little bit of all of us.
One of the most difficult things for an actor to do is to be honestly themselves. Irrfan, for one, embraced it all with open arms. Whether it was the hope in the helplessness of Piscine ‘Pi’ Patel, the courage and OTT love of Champak Bansal and Raj Batra, the reserved fear and unnerved respectability of Ashoke Ganguli, the childlike hope of Saajan Fernandes or just the slivered rawness of Paan Singh Tomar and Rana ‘non-Bengali’ Chaudhary, he could capture every emotion, every shade of the human personality with similar seamlessness. All of the moments and circumstances that life offers seemed to be seeped into the work of this artist who embraced it all with open arms, and so, from ordinary men that history has forgotten to men that have written history, Irrfan bound them all with a soul that does not discriminate, even if life and time do.
He was a critically acclaimed actor who was also deeply loved by the masses. Irrfan was the unassuming Khan who achieved immeasurable success and respect but never acted like he was indebted to it. There was grace in his success and truth in his work and it’s only because of all this that he has become the very jaan of the ordinary lives his films depict
His success on the international front is aspirational for every artist who hopes to do justice to the craft. Even more commendable, his ability to connect on at the deepest level while representing the country and holding his ground on every stage he set foot on, whether domestic and international.
To the person he was, it’s almost as if the divisiveness that holds us all captive never bound him at all. He transcended the boundaries of race and class as if all he saw was the human in the audience and all his purpose ever was to tell their story. A lot of us had nothing in common with the characters he played, but every time we saw him, it felt like someone we knew. In his own way, he left us more loving or at least acknowledging of the people who populate our lives.
He may not with us today but what he represents will set precedent for generations of artists to come. We have seen his characters smile at the twisted glory of life and it is with this same smile that we will remember him.
Irrfan Khan (7 January 1967 – 29 April 2020) was an Indian actor, known for his work predominantly in Hindi cinema, in addition to British and American films. In a career spanning over 30 years and featuring in more than 50 domestic films, Khan had received numerous awards, including a National Film Award and Filmfare Awards in four categories. Film critics, contemporaries and other experts consider him to be one of the finest actors in Indian cinema. In 2011, he was awarded the Padma Shri, India’s fourth-highest civilian honour. He had been diagnosed with neuroendocrine tumour in 2018 and was battling a colon infection before he left us. Our love goes out to his wife and children and the industry and the country that loved him for all that he created for us.
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