Amitabh Bachchan & Rishi Kapoor’s Magic; From Kabhi Kabhie To 102 Not Out

Amitabh Bachchan and Rishi Kapoor, a hit pair have come together in 102 Not Out, where Rishi plays a grumpy 75 year son of Amitabh, who at 102 has the mind of a teen. The terrific duo are were last seen in Ajooba 27 years back. Lets go through a trivia journey of their movies together.

Kabhi Kabhie in 1976 was the 1st movie in which Amitabh and Rishi were together. It was a multi-starrer with Shashi Kapoor, Raakhee, Waheeda Rehman and Neetu Singh. Kabhi Kabhie was an important film in Amitabh’s career as it presented him in a role different from his angry young man image. It consolidated Rishi-Neetu hit pair as well, as this was soon after their super hit Khel Khel Mein and Rafoo Chakkar.

Amar Akbar Anthony was the biggest hit of 1977. Rishi played Akbar while Amitabh played Anthony. The original name for Amitabh’s character was Anthony Fernandes but music directors Laxmikant-Pyarelal did not approve of the name and Pyarelal remamed it to Anthony Gonsalves after his violin teacher. In the song My name is Anthony Gonsalves, Amitabh speaks the famous dialogue “you are a sophisticated rhetorician intoxicated with the exuberance of your own verbosity” with an accent and this was inspired by Disraeli speaking about Gladstone. Amitabh won the best actor award for his role. Rishi and Vinod too were well appreciated.

This movie’s song Humko tumse ho gaya hai pyar kya kare is the only song which has the 4 legendary playback singers Kishore, Rafi, Mukesh and Lata in the same song. The 3 legends sang for Amitabh, Vinod and Rishi while Lata sang for all the 3 heroines. During picturisation, Kishore Kumar who had deep respect for Lata remarked , “three singers are required for three heroes, but to sing with us three singers, one Devi (Goddess) is enough”.

Naseeb was the next movie featuring Amitabh and Rishi. Vinod Khanna took a break from movies and hence he was replaced by Shatrughan Sinha, otherwise Manmohan Desai had wanted the 3 heroes of Amar Akbar Anthony in Naseeb as well. The song John Johnny Janardhan had cameo appearances by many actors playing themselves. Since it was a Manmohan Desai film so many stars agreed that Desai had to request Raj Kapoor to coordinate and manage them. The song Chal chal mere bhai showed the terrific chemistry between Amitabh and Rishi.

Coolie as a movie had the famous Amitabh fight scene where he got almost fatally injured. The entire country came to a standstill and millions prayed for the superstar. Apparently Coolie originally had a sad ending which was changed as it was felt that the audience would not accept Amitabh’s death after rejoicing his recovery in real life. Rishi name in Coolie too was Sunny, as it was in Naseeb. The song Lambuji, lambuji, bolo tinguji like Chal chal mere bhai once again showed the terrific chemistry between the duo.

Ajooba in 1991 was the last movie Amitabh and Rishi starred in before 102 Not out. Amitabh plays a masked Zorro type hero in this fantasy. Neither Amitabh not Rishi took fees for this movie which Shashi kapoor had primarily made to rescue himself from his financial issues. Shashi wanted Raj Kapoor to direct the movie but due to his failing health he could not, and Amitabh and Jaya Bachchan convinced Shashi to direct it himself.

Hopefully 102 Not out will not be their last film together