Kapoor family
The Kapoor family is a prominent Indian show business family with a long history in Hindi cinema, many members of the family have had careers as actors, film directors, and producers.
The Kapoor family is of Punjabi Hindu origin. Prithviraj Kapoor was the first from the family to pursue a career in films. He was born in 1906 in the town of Samundri in Punjab Province, British India.His father, Basheshwarnath Kapoor, served as a police officer in the Indian Imperial Police in the city of Peshawar;while his grandfather, Keshavmal Kapoor, was a Tehsildar in Samundri, Punjab, British India.Prithviraj's first lead role was in Cinema Girl in 1929.
All three of Prithviraj Kapoor's sons, Raj Kapoor, Shammi Kapoor, and Shashi Kapoor, made careers in the Hindi film industry. Raj Kapoor also known as "the greatest showman of Indian cinema",became a noted Indian film actor, producer and director of Hindi cinema.
Raj Kapoor's sons, Randhir Kapoor and Rishi Kapoor, went on to become well-known actors; his youngest son, Rajiv Kapoor, was not as successful as his brothers. Shashi Kapoor's daughter Sanjana Kapoor also became a film actress, although she had a short career.
Randhir Kapoor is married to Babita. They have two daughters Karisma Kapoor and Kareena Kapoor, both of whom have found success in the film industry. Rishi Kapoor is married to actress Neetu Singh, their son, Ranbir Kapoor, has established himself as a leading Bollywood actor.
Nikhil Nanda, son of Ritu Kapoor, Raj Kapoor's daughter and Rajan Nanda, is married to Shweta Bachchan, daughter of the actors Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bachchan.
Shashi Kapoor
(born as Balbir Prithviraj Kapoor; 18 March 1938 – 4 December 2017)
Indian film actor and producer. He appeared in a large number of Hindi films as well as in a few English-language films. He also been a film director and assistant director in the Hindi film industry.
Shashi Kapoor was a member of the Kapoor family, a film dynasty in India's Bollywood cinema. Kapoor was born in Calcutta(now Kolkata) during the British Raj. He was the 3rd and the youngest son of Prithviraj Kapoor, the younger brother of Raj Kapoor and Shammi Kapoor, the widower of Jennifer Kendal (sister of actress Felicity Kendal), and the father of Karan Kapoor, Kunal Kapoor, and Sanjana Kapoor. In 2011, he was honoured with the Padma Bhushan by the Government of India for his contributions to Art-Cinema.In 2015,
he was awarded the 2014 Dadasaheb Phalke Award, making him the third member of his family to receive the highest award in Indian Cinema after Prithviraj Kapoor and Raj Kapoor.
He was admitted for a reported chest infection at Kokilaben Hospital, Mumbai on 3 December 2017 and passed away on 4 December 2017 due to a prolonged liver cirrhosis.
Shashi Kapoor acted in plays directed and produced by his father Prithviraj Kapoor, while traveling with Prithvi Theatres. He started acting in films as a child in the late 1940s, appearing in commercial films including Sangram (1950) and Dana Paani (1953) under the name of Shashiraj as there was another actor by the same name who used to act in mythological films as a child artiste. His best-known performances as child actor were in Aag (1948) and Awaara (1951), where he played the younger version of the characters played by his older brother Raj Kapoor and in Sangram (1950), where he played the younger version of Ashok Kumar. He worked in four Hindi films as a child artiste from 1948 to 1954.
Kapoor got an opportunity to work as an assistant director in the film Post Box 999, the debut film of Sunil Dutt, and worked as an assistant director to Ravindra Dave in Guest House (1959), which was followed by movies such as Dulha Dulhan and Shriman Satyawadi, where Raj Kapoor was the lead hero.
Shashi Kapoor made his debut as a leading man in the 1961 film Dharmputra and went on to appear in 116 Hindi films, including 61 films as the solo lead hero and 55 multi star-cast films, 21 films as supporting actor and special appearance in 7 films. He was a very popular actor in Bollywood during the 60s, 70s and until the mid-80s. Kapoor's early films, Dharmputra, Prem Patra, and Char Diwari, were in Hindi. Since 1961, he started acting in English language films, which include The Householder and Shakespeare-Wallah. He was one of India's first actors to go international.Actress Nanda, who was an established star at this time,signed 8 Hindi films with Kapoor, as she believed that he could deliver good performances.Their first two films as a pair were the critically acclaimed romantic film Char Diwari (1961) and Mehndi Lagi Mere Haath (1962). In the 1960s Kapoor acted in several romantic films opposite Nanda, including Mohabbat Isko Kahete Hain (1965), Jab Jab Phool Khile (1965), Neend Hamari Khwab Tumhare (1966), Raja Saab (1969) and Rootha Na Karo (1970). In an interview in the 1990s, Kapoor declared that Nanda was his favorite heroine and that he regarded her as one of his mentors.[14] In another interview, Nanda stated that Shashi Kapoor was her favorite hero.
Shashi Kapoor was 2nd highest paid Hindi actor, sharing the spot with Devanand from 1970-75 and 3rd third highest paid Hindi actor, sharing space with Vinod Khanna from 1976-82.The highest paid Indian actor was Rajesh Khanna from 1970-1987.Shashi was paid more than co-actors Vinod Khanna, Amitabh Bachchan, Jeetendra, Rishi and Randhir Kapoor in multi-starrer films. However, Sanjeev Kumar, Pran and Dharmendra were paid at same rate as Shashi. Among all leading actors, only Rajesh Khanna was paid more than Shashi in the 2 films they acted together – Prem Kahani and Alag Alag.
Shashi regarded Rajesh Khanna and Sanjeev Kumar as the most versatile actors of Hindi Cinema from among his contemporaries and he regarded these 2 along-with his seniors Pran and Ashok Kumar from 1930-2000 as the most versatile from Hindi Cinema.He respected M G Ramachandran and Sivaji Ganeshan among the Tamil film actors for their body of work. He believed Amitabh did mostly angry young man or multi-star films from 1975 to 1999 and turned versatile only after 2000.
He personally regarded his best performances as solo lead hero in Hindi films were in Neend Hamari Khwab Tumhare , Jab Jab Phool Khile, Haseena Maan Jayegi , Pyar Ka Mausam, Raja Saab (1969), Jaanwar Aur Insaan, Mr.Romeo, Aa Gale Lag Jaa, Chori Mera Kaam, Phaansi, Junoon, Kalyug , Pighalta Aasman, New Delhi Times and among the English films he did he feels his best were Shakespeare-Wallah, A Matter of Innocence (1967), Heat and Dust (1983), In Custody (1994).Among the multi star films his personal favorites are Pyar Kiye Jaa, Prem Kahani, Deewar, Mukti, Trishna, Basera, Heeralal Pannalal, Bezubaan, Alag Alag.
He regarded Nanda, Pran, Dharmendra, Dev Anand, Ismail Merchant, Rajesh Khanna, Sanjeev Kumar as his closest friends from the industry since the beginning of his career and maintained cordial relations with Amitabh Bachchan, Yash Chopra, MGR, Kishore Kumar, Mohammed Rafi, Lata Mangeshkar and most of his co-stars.
In the whole of the Kapoor clan, Shashi Kapoor has been the solo hero more times (61 films) and also as a lead protagonist in more Hindi films(116) than his nephews Rishi Kapoor,Randhir Kapoor and Rajiv and even more than his brothers Raj Kapoor, Shammi Kapoor and more than his grand-nephews and grand-nieces.
He accepted very few roles as a character actor in films since 1987. He acted with Pierce Brosnan in The Deceivers (1988). He also won a National (special jury) Award for his performance in Muhafiz (In Custody) (1994), and played the Rajah in the TV adaptation of Gulliver's Travels (1996). His last and most recent film appearances were in Jinnah (1998), a biographical film of Mohammed Ali Jinnah in which he was the narrator and another Merchant Ivory production titled Side Streets (1998). He retired from the film industry by late 1990s and had not appeared in any film ever since. He was seen in the limelight at the Shashi Kapoor Film Festival held in Muscat, Oman (September 2007). At the 55th Annual Filmfare Awards, Shashi Kapoor received the Filmfare Lifetime Achievement Award.
Personal life
He met English actress Jennifer Kendal in Calcutta in 1956 while both were working for their respective theatre groups. Shashi was both assistant stage manager as well as an actor for his father's theatre group, Prithvi Theatre. Geoffrey Kendal's Shakespearean group was also present at the same time in Calcutta and Jennifer was Geoffrey's daughter. After their subsequent meeting,
the couple fell in love and after facing initial opposition from the Kendals and support from sister-in-law Geeta Bali,
they got married in July 1958.They acted in a number of films together, most notably in Merchant Ivory productions.
They had three children: Kunal Kapoor, Karan Kapoor and Sanjana Kapoor. Jennifer and Shashi established Prithvi Theatre on 5 November 1978 in Mumbai.Jennifer died of cancer in 1984 which shattered him. The English actress Felicity Kendal is his sister-in-law.
Kapoor's children, for a short while, became Hindi film actors but their European looks and accented Hindi prevented them from having successful careers. His eldest son Kunal is married to director Ramesh Sippy's daughter. Kunal moved on to ad film direction and established his production house Adfilm-Valas which is today extremely successful.Shashi's daughter Sanjana, is a theatre personality and married to wildlife conservationist Valmik Thapar.They have a son named Hamir. Shashi's younger son Karan became successful in modeling and later settled down in London. He is an accomplished photographer.
On 20 July 2012, Shashi Kapoor underwent a cataract surgery at Kokilaben Hospital in suburban Andheri. He was discharged from the hospital the same day.
Kapoor was admitted at the Kokilaben Hospital, Mumbai, on December 3, 2017 for chest infection,where he reportedly died due to liver cirrhosis at the age of 79 on 5.20 pm, according to the Kokilaben Hospital as confirmed to the Press Trust of India (PTI).
The PTI quotes his nephew Randhir Kapoor, who states that the actor was suffering from kidney failure. "Yes he has passed away. He had kidney problem since several years. He was on dialysis for several years." Kapoor is survived by two sons, Kunal and Karan, and a daughter, Sanjana, who takes care of the Prithvi Theatre.
18 March 1938 – 4 December 2017
the end of era and begins with new era
