Ashutosh Gowariker's 'Fair & Lovely' Everest: Scaling new heights in bad television

Size has always mattered to Ashutosh Gowariker.

Whether it be the length of his films (which usually clock in around 4 hours) or the mega-stars he casts in them (I’m discounting Harman Baweja here) or the scale of his productions.

So it’s only fair that his first television show should also be about the tallest peak in the world, Everest.

Now I’ve loved Gowariker’s first few films, especially his attention to detail and recreation of the period his films have been set in. So, despite the last two doozies he directed – Khelein Hum Jee Jaan Sey and What’s Your Rashee? – I still held out hope for this show.

This is part of Star’s new face-lift. They began with Airlines. About a woman pilot. Taking forward the emancipation theme, this show is about another woman trying to break the role society and her family lays out for her. Just to drive home the emancipation theme a little more, it’s also sponsored by Fair and Lovely – which always encourages all us women to make it on our own, just with a lighter shade of skin.

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The star of the show is of a wheatish complexion, and I shall be watching to see if her fairness keeps increasing as she scales new heights on the show.

The show, which is produced by Gowariker has been publicised as one of the most expensive shows on TV. It has supposedly been shot at Everest base camp and Dokriani Glacier over the last two years. The opening shot though, of Anjali Singh Rawat (the soon-to-be emancipated one) walking through the snow, looks like it’s been shot on a set.

You see her in climbing gear, sans oxygen cylinder, walking all alone. There is not one person who can be seen anywhere in the vicinity. She then comes upon a crevice, looks down and spots what can only be described as a human-sized doll, lying on an ice shelf in the crevice with spray painted blood around him.

And this is where you wonder why producers and directors like Gowariker don’t realise that even if a shot is for barely 40 seconds, you must make an effort. Would it have killed Gowariker, to get a real person to lie prostate and pretend to have fallen to his death, for 40 seconds in that crevice? That’s just shoddy.

Also, I may not have climbed Everest, but I have read enough books and watched enough fiction and non-fiction shows about people who have done so. The one thing you keep noticing and hearing and reading is that no one goes alone to climb Everest. You’ll have a Sherpa with you, or a team of people, or a companion. Especially if you’re a first-timer. But not in this opening shot. Here, the star of the show is the lone person for miles on the mountain and has no one for company. Okay then.

After we’ve realised she’s made it to the mountain, and watch another Fair and Lovely ad, we go into flashback mode.

The girl is from Jodhpur. Her father is Brigadier Jagath Singh Rawat who always wanted a son. Now he has to make do with a daughter, who is a state topper. But he doesn’t care. Her mother loves her and tries to be a salve to her neglected soul.

Then we cut to another storyline.

A young man goes to meet an older woman – Suhasini Mulay.

And finally we see some good acting, thanks to Mulay. The boy has his own personal cross to bear. He’s a TV reporter who had watched his friend die by falling off a building, while on a shoot. And he couldn’t save him. Suhasini Mulay is the friend’s mother.

This boy, Aakaash (yes, there are so many As in the character’s name), is called in for a meeting with Rajat Kapoor, who always reminds me of the creepy uncle from Monsoon Wedding. Kapoor is the CEO of a company which is sponsoring a mountaineer called Arjun Sabhrawal to scale Everest. He wants to hire Aakash as the person who will shoot Sabhrawal scaling Everest.

The first episode ended with Anjali realising her father always wanted a son (this why you should never eavesdrop on your parents’ conversations, because you never know what you may learn). She then stands on the parapet and throws her state topper award over the parapet. And vows that she will make her father proud.

The flipside of casting newcomers is that more often than not, they can’t act. Which is what happens here. Other than for Suhasini Mulay, no one else displayed any acting chops in one hour. Yaami Gautam was more convincing as the Fair and Lovely doctor/ advisor in her ad, than these characters were.

Also, we are no longer viewing shows in pre-cable TV times. Even if viewers don’t have DTH, they’ll have cable. They get to watch programmes of spectacular production value on any international channel.

Everyone has access to a National Geographic or even Star Plus’ own sister channel - Star World. So if you’re making a show on Everest and you’re Ashutosh Gowariker, you need to make the portions on the mountain spectacular and gritty and most importantly – real. Not this fake rubbish. The scene of her walking on a ladder over a crevice with the dead doll below was ludicrous. And it’s one of the first few scenes of the episode.

The characters are over the top in their dialogue delivery and their behaviour. The unloving father never cracks a smile. He talks to camera without looking at anyone. Rajat Kapur is evil and therefore smile-less as well. There is simply no nuance of layering in anyone’s character.

What stayed with me though, is that this is a branding coup.

A show on a woman establishing her identity is sponsored by Fair and Lovely. The Star Plus ad sales team should get a standing ovation for this. So every time the heroine of the show scales a new height, Yaami Gautam comes on screen to tell us how Fair and Lovely Academy while making us a shade fairer is also going to make us a shade more successful.

If you look far in the distant at left of screen, you can see Irony hanging herself while standing on a pile on Fair and Lovely tubes.

This is the first episode though, and maybe the show will pick up speed. Even if Gowariker doesn’t manage to change the face of television, at least Fair and Lovely will have sold many many more tubes of emancipation by the end of the series and changed the faces – and futures, let’s not forget – of many women in India.

You can watch Everest on Star Plus from Monday to Friday at 10pm.

Disclaimer: Firstpost is owned by Network 18 which also owns Colors that competes with Star Plus