I'm deeply stressed as a filmmaker, and I know I'm not alone. The censorship crisis, the moral policing, the politics of it has most of us on edge. I'm scared to use certain words: like, if I use 'Bombay,' will there be a problem?
Throughout my life, I have valued relationships far more than the professionalism.
I do not understand why we are not raised to celebrate our bodies as children. Why we are told to be shy or awkward or self-conscious.
I don't know about happy endings, because I don't think, eventually, anything is happy. You feel a bout of happiness with good news. Five minutes later, there could be a traffic jam or a phone call from an irritating relative or a weird thought, or it could be a tweet that annoys you, and your emotion will flip immediately.
Tell me, who doesn't want to have a family to extend himself/herself?
From the time you open the newspapers to the time the lights go off at night, it's all lies. We lie the most to the people closest to us. For fear of hurting them, breaking their heart, or worrying them.
The first time I fell in love, I was in my 20s, and I loved someone right till I was 31. And then I felt that emotion died within me. I wasn't feeling alive at all.
I grew up as the only child, and we did not have a large family. So for me and my mother, our friends tend to become our family.
My father was 40 when he had me, so he was more a grandparent than a parent.
There are ups and downs in so many relationships, but with Shah Rukh, there is deep love. There's no other way of communicating the respect and love I have for him. And I believe that ours will be a dynamic, and relationship and connect that will be forever.
I remember breaking the news to both my parents that I wanted to be a director, and they both looked very doubtful. They didn't know what a closet Hindi film buff I was. I used to dance to old Hindi films songs on the sly, so my decision to be a part of Hindi cinema was shocking even for my parents.
For me, my country comes first. Nothing else matters but my country. I always felt that the best way to express your patriotism is to spread love, and that's all I ever tried to do through my work and my cinema.
I have invariably been in love when I haven't had the same reciprocated emotion at all. I don't choose to talk about my personal life because I believe that I don't want to, and I believe my personal life is personal.
When I'm making a film, I'm obsessive about what I do, and I get totally into it. That's all I'm eating, breathing, living at that moment.
I find that I don't lie about the big things in life. The things that matter. And about me. While I'm talking about myself, I rarely lie: I know who I am, my level of talent, that I'm not the most versatile filmmaker, the person I am. I don't lie about myself because I don't lie to myself.
My mother was keen that I complete my graduation and never ever wanted me to be in the movies, as my father had made five films that lost money. One of the films he made was 'Agneepath,' which was hugely hyped but underwhelming at the box office, and I remember that my dad had to sell my grandmother's flat to pay off the loan.
Infidelity has always existed, but I feel like it was brushed under the carpet, behind the scenes. Now everyone is at it - and they've stopped pretending they're not.
My very shy Punjabi father never taught me about the birds and bees. So shy was he that he may have thought he would get arrested for even talking about it.
Marriage is a definite no-no. I am totally married to my company. Emotionally, my mother fills up the void in my life. So there it is. My company is a spouse I will never cheat on, and my mother completes me as a son. I think I have a full family unit of my own.
I think that I have self esteem issues, really. If you really analyse it... People who really like me I have no interest in. The unattainable is always that I want to attain.
