Shah Rukh Khan (pronounced [???????x x??n]; born 2 November 1965), also known by the initialism SRK, is an Indian actor, film producer, and television personality who works in Hindi films. Referred to in the media as the "Baadshah of Bollywood" (in reference to his 1999 film Baadshah), "King of Bollywood" and "King Khan", he has appeared in more than 80 films, and earned numerous accolades, including 14 Filmfare Awards. The Government of India has awarded him the Padma Shri, and the Government of France has awarded him the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and the Legion of Honour. Khan has a significant following in Asia and the Indian diaspora worldwide.
Khan began his career with appearances in several television series in the late 1980s. He made his Bollywood debut in 1992 with Deewana. Early in his career, Khan was recognised for portraying villainous roles in the films Baazigar (1993), Darr (1993), and Anjaam (1994). He then rose to prominence after starring in a series of romantic films, including Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995), Dil To Pagal Hai (1997), Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (1998), Mohabbatein (2000) and Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham... (2001). Khan went on to earn critical acclaim for his portrayal of an alcoholic in Devdas (2002), a NASA scientist in Swades (2004), a hockey coach in Chak De! India (2007) and a man with Asperger syndrome in My Name Is Khan (2010). His highest-grossing films include the comedies Chennai Express (2013), Happy New Year (2014), Dilwale (2015), and the crime film Raees (2017). Many of his films display themes of Indian national identity and connections with diaspora communities, or gender, racial, social and religious differences and grievances.
As of 2015, Khan is co-chairman of the motion picture production company Red Chillies Entertainment and its subsidiaries and is the co-owner of the Indian Premier League cricket team Kolkata Knight Riders and the Caribbean Premier League team Trinbago Knight Riders. He is a frequent television presenter and stage show performer. The media often label him as "Brand SRK" because of his many endorsement and entrepreneurship ventures. Khan's philanthropic endeavours have provided health care and disaster relief, and he was honoured with UNESCO's Pyramide con Marni award in 2011 for his support of children's education and the World Economic Forum's Crystal Award in 2018 for his leadership in championing women's and children's rights in India. He regularly features in listings of the most influential people in Indian culture, and in 2008, Newsweek named him one of their fifty most powerful people in the world.
See also: Shah Rukh Khan filmography
Khan's first starring role was in Lekh Tandon's television series Dil Dariya, which began shooting in 1988, but production delays led to the Raj Kumar Kapoor directed 1989 series Fauji becoming his television debut instead.[49] In the series, which depicted a realistic look at the training of army cadets, he played the leading role of Abhimanyu Rai.[50][51] This led to further appearances in Aziz Mirza's television series Circus (1989–90) and Mani Kaul's miniseries Idiot (1992).[52] Khan also played minor parts in the serials Umeed (1989) and Wagle Ki Duniya (1988–90),[52] and in the English-language television film In Which Annie Gives It Those Ones (1989).[53] His appearances in these serials led critics to compare his look and acting style with those of the film actor Dilip Kumar,[54] but Khan was not interested in film acting at the time, thinking that he was not good enough.[52][55]
Khan changed his decision to act in films in April 1991,[56] citing it as a way to escape the grief of his mother's death.[57] He moved from Delhi to Mumbai to pursue a full-time career in Bollywood, and was quickly signed to four films.[56] His first offer was for Hema Malini's directorial debut Dil Aashna Hai,[29][50] and by June, he had started his first shoot.[58] His film debut was in Deewana, which was released in June 1992.[59] In it he starred alongside Divya Bharti as the second male lead behind Rishi Kapoor. Deewana became a box office hit and launched Khan's Bollywood career;[60] he earned the Filmfare Best Male Debut Award for his performance.[61] Also released in 1992 were Khan's first films as the male lead, Chamatkar, Dil Aashna Hai, and the comedy Raju Ban Gaya Gentleman, which was his first of many collaborations with the actress Juhi Chawla.[62] His initial film roles saw him play characters who displayed energy and enthusiasm. According to Arnab Ray of Daily News and Analysis, Khan brought a new kind of acting as he was "sliding down stairs on a slab of ice, cartwheeling, somersaulting, lips trembling, eyes trembling, bringing to the screen the kind of physical energy ... visceral, intense, maniacal one moment and cloyingly boyish the next."[63]
Among his 1993 releases, Khan garnered the most appreciation for portraying villainous roles in two box office hits: a murderer in Baazigar, and an obsessive lover in Darr.[64] Baazigar, in which Khan played an ambiguous avenger who murders his girlfriend, shocked Indian audiences with an unexpected violation of the standard Bollywood formula.[65] In The Cambridge Companion to Modern Indian Culture, Sonal Khullar called the character "the consummate anti-hero".[66] His performance in Baazigar, which would be his first of many appearances with actress Kajol, won Khan his first Filmfare Award for Best Actor.[67] In 2003, the Encyclopaedia of Hindi Cinema stated that Khan "defied the image of the conventional hero in both these films and created his own version of the revisionist hero".[67] Darr marked the first of Khan's many collaborations with filmmaker Yash Chopra and his company Yash Raj Films. Khan's stammering and the use of the phrase "I love you, K-k-k-Kiran" were popular with audiences.[68] Malini Mannath of The Indian Express argued that he "walks away with the acting honours in yet another negative role".[69] For Darr he received a nomination for the Filmfare Award for Best Performance in a Negative Role, also known as the Best Villain Award, but lost to Paresh Rawal for Sir.[70] Also in 1993, Khan performed a nude scene with Deepa Sahi in Maya Memsaab, although parts of it were censored by the Central Board of Film Certification.[71] The ensuing controversy prompted him to eschew such scenes in future roles.[72]
In 1994, Khan played a love-struck musician in Kundan Shah's comedy-drama film Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa opposite Deepak Tijori and Suchitra Krishnamurthy, which he later professed was his favourite role. His performance earned him a Filmfare Critics Award for Best Performance, and in a retrospective review from 2004, Sukanya Verma of Rediff.com referred to it as Khan's best performance, calling him "spontaneous, vulnerable, boyish, mischievous and acting straight from the heart".[73] Also in 1994, Khan won the Filmfare Best Villain Award for his role as an obsessive lover in Anjaam, co-starring Madhuri Dixit.[67] At the time, playing antagonistic roles was considered risky to a leading man's career in mainstream Hindi cinema. Arnab Ray subsequently credited Khan for taking "insane risks" and "pushing the envelope" by choosing to play such characters, through which he established his career.[63] The director Mukul S. Anand called him "the new face of the industry" at the time.[57]
Khan with co-star Kajol in 2014 celebrating 1000 weeks continuous showing of their film Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge
Khan starred in seven films in 1995, the first of which was Rakesh Roshan's melodramatic thriller Karan Arjun. Co-starring Salman Khan and Kajol, it became the second-highest-grossing film of the year in India.[74] His most significant release that year was Aditya Chopra's directorial debut, the romance Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, in which he played a young Non-resident Indian (NRI) who falls in love with Kajol's character during a trip across Europe. Khan was initially reticent to portray the role of a lover, but this film is credited with establishing him as a "romantic hero".[75] Lauded by both critics and the public, it became the year's highest grossing production in India and abroad and was declared an "all time blockbuster" by Box Office India,[74][76] with an estimated lifetime gross of ?2 billion (US$61.68 million) worldwide.[77][78] It is the longest-running film in the history of Indian cinema; it is still showing at the Maratha Mandir theatre in Mumbai after more than 1000 weeks as of early 2015.[79][80] The film won ten Filmfare Awards, including the second of Khan's Best Actor Awards.[67] The director and critic Raja Sen said, "Khan gives a fabulous performance, redefining the lover for the 1990s with great panache. He's cool and flippant, but sincere enough to appeal to the [audience]. The performance itself is, like the best in the business, played well enough to come across as effortless, as non-acting."[81]
In 1996, all four of Khan's releases failed critically and commercially,[82] but the following year, his starring role opposite Aditya Pancholi and Juhi Chawla in Aziz Mirza's romantic comedy Yes Boss earned him accolades that included a Filmfare Best Actor nomination.[70] Later in 1997, he starred in Subhash Ghai's diasporic-themed social drama Pardes,[83] portraying Arjun, a musician facing a moral dilemma. India Today cites it as one of the first major Bollywood pictures to succeed in the United States.[84] Khan's final release of 1997 was the second collaboration with Yash Chopra in the popular musical romance Dil To Pagal Hai. He portrayed Rahul, a stage director caught in a love triangle between Madhuri Dixit and Karisma Kapoor. The film and his performance met with critical praise, winning Khan his third Best Actor Award at Filmfare.[67]
Khan performed the lead role in three films and made one special appearance in 1998. In his first release of the year, he played a double role opposite Juhi Chawla and Sonali Bendre in Mahesh Bhatt's action comedy Duplicate, the first of his many collaborations with Yash Johar's production company Dharma Productions. The film was not well received,[85] but India Today lauded Khan for his energetic performance.[86] The same year, Khan won critical praise for his performance as an All India Radio correspondent who develops an infatuation for a mysterious terrorist (Manisha Koirala) in Dil Se..,[87] the third instalment of Mani Ratnam's trilogy of terror films.[88][89] In his final release of the year, he portrayed a college student in Karan Johar's romance Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, in which he was involved in a love triangle along with Kajol and Rani Mukerji. The writer Anjana Motihar Chandra has referred to the picture as the blockbuster of the 1990s, a "pot-pourri of romance, comedy, and entertainment."[90] Khan won the Best Actor award at the Filmfare Awards ceremony for the second consecutive year,[67] although he and several critics believed his performance to have been overshadowed by that of Kajol.[91]
The roles in this phase of his career, and the series of romantic comedies and family dramas that followed, earned Khan widespread adulation from audiences, particularly teenagers,[92] and according to author Anupama Chopra, established him as an icon of romance in India.[93][94] He continued to have frequent professional associations with Yash Chopra, Aditya Chopra, and Karan Johar, who moulded his image and made him into a superstar.[95] Khan became a romantic leading man without ever actually kissing any of his co-stars,[93] although he broke this rule in 2012, after strong urging by Yash Chopra.[96]
Khan in 2000
Khan's only release in 1999 was Baadshah, in which he starred opposite Twinkle Khanna. Although the film underperformed at the box office,[97] it earned him a Filmfare Award nomination for Best Performance in a Comic Role, which he lost to Govinda for Haseena Maan Jaayegi.[70] Khan became a producer in 1999 in a collaboration with the actress Juhi Chawla and the director Aziz Mirza for a production company called Dreamz Unlimited.[98] The company's first production, Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani (2000), starring Khan and Chawla, was a commercial failure.[99] It was released one week after Kaho Naa... Pyaar Hai, starring Hrithik Roshan, then a newcomer, who critics believed overshadowed Khan.[100] Swapna Mitter of Rediff.com spoke of Khan's predictable mannerisms, saying "Frankly, it's high time he innovated his act a little."[101] Khan did a supporting role in Kamal Haasan's Hey Ram (2000), which was made simultaneously in Tamil and Hindi. He thereby made his Tamil debut by playing the role of an archaeologist named Amjad Khan.[102] He performed free of charge as he wanted to work with Haasan.[103][104] On Khan's performance, T. Krithika Reddy of The Hindu wrote, "Shah Rukh Khan, as usual comes up with an impeccable performance."[102]
In 2001, Dreamz Unlimited attempted a comeback with Khan portraying the title role in Santosh Sivan's historical epic A?oka, a partly fictionalised account of the life of emperor Ashoka. The film was screened at the Venice Film Festival and the 2001 Toronto International Film Festival to a positive response,[105] but it performed poorly at Indian box offices.[106] As losses continued to mount for the production company,[100] Khan was forced to close srkworld.com, a company that he had started along with Dreamz Unlimited.[107] In December 2001, Khan suffered a spinal injury while performing an action sequence for a special appearance in Krishna Vamsi's Shakti: The Power.[108] He was subsequently diagnosed with a prolapsed disc, and attempted multiple alternative therapies. None of these provided a permanent solution to the injury, which caused him severe pain while shooting several of his films.[108][109] By the beginning of 2003, his condition had worsened to the point that he had to undergo anterior cervical discectomy and fusion surgery at Wellington Hospital, London.[110][111][112] Khan resumed shooting in June 2003, but he reduced his workload and the number of film roles he accepted annually.[109]
Khan with co-star Aishwarya Rai at the home video launch of their film Devdas (2002)
Successes during this time included Aditya Chopra's Mohabbatein (2000), and Karan Johar's family drama Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham... (2001),[99][113] which Khan cites as a turning point in his career.[114] Both films co-starred Amitabh Bachchan as an authoritarian figure, and presented ideological struggles between the two men.[115][116] Khan's performances in the films were met with wide public appreciation, and he was awarded his second Filmfare Critics Award for Best Actor for Mohabbatein.[70][117] Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham... remained the top-grossing Indian production of all time in the overseas market for the next five years.[118]
In 2002, Khan played the title role as a rebellious alcoholic opposite Aishwarya Rai and Madhuri Dixit in Sanjay Leela Bhansali's period romance Devdas. At a cost of over ?500 million (US$10.29 million), it was the most expensive Bollywood film ever made at the time,[119] and became a box office success, earning approximately ?1.68 billion ($35 million) worldwide.[120] The film earned numerous accolades including 10 Filmfare Awards, with Best Actor for Khan,[61] and a BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language.[121] Khan next starred in Kal Ho Naa Ho (2003), a comedy-drama written by Karan Johar and set in New York City, which became the second-highest-grossing film domestically and the top-grossing Bollywood film in external markets that year.[113][122] Co-starring with Jaya Bachchan, Saif Ali Khan, and Preity Zinta, Khan received critical praise for his portrayal of Aman Mathur, a man with a fatal heart disease, with critics praising his emotional impact upon audiences.[123] Conflict broke out between Khan and the other partners of Dreamz Unlimited over the failure to cast Juhi Chawla in their 2003 production of Aziz Mirza's Chalte Chalte, and they parted ways, despite the film's success.[124]
2004 was a critically and commercially successful year for Khan. He transformed Dreamz Unlimited into Red Chillies Entertainment, adding his wife Gauri as a producer.[125] In the company's first production, he starred in Farah Khan's directorial debut, the masala film Main Hoon Na. A fictionalised account of India–Pakistan relations, it was viewed by some commentators as a conscious effort to move away from the stereotypical portrayal of Pakistan as the constant villain.[126] Khan then played an Indian Air Force pilot who falls in love with a Pakistani woman (Preity Zinta) in Yash Chopra's romance film Veer-Zaara, which was screened at the 55th Berlin Film Festival to critical praise.[127] It was the highest earning film of 2004 in India, with a worldwide gross of over ?940 million (US$20.74 million), and Main Hoon Na was the second-highest earner with ?680 million (US$15.01 million).[118][128]
Khan with Priyanka Chopra at the premiere for Don in 2006
In his final release of 2004, Khan starred as a NASA scientist who patriotically returns to India to rekindle his roots in Ashutosh Gowariker's social drama Swades (meaning "Homeland"), which became the first Indian picture to be shot inside the NASA research centre at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.[129] Film scholar Stephen Teo refers to the picture as an example of "Bollywoodised realism", displaying a transcendence in conventional narrative and audience expectation in Hindi cinema.[130] In December 2013, The Times of India reported that Khan found filming the picture such an emotionally overwhelming and life-changing experience that he had still not viewed the film.[131] Derek Elley of Variety found Khan's performance "unsettling" as "a self-satisfied expatriate determined to bring Western values to poor Indian peasants",[132] but several film critics, including Jitesh Pillai, believed it to have been his finest acting to date.[133][134] He was nominated for the Filmfare Best Actor Award for all three of his 2004 releases and eventually won the award for Swades.[61][70] Filmfare later included his performance in the 2010 issue of Bollywood's "Top 80 Iconic Performances".[135]
In 2005, Khan starred in Amol Palekar's fantasy drama, Paheli. The film was India's submission for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 79th Academy Awards.[136] He later collaborated with Karan Johar for the third time in the musical romantic drama Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna (2006), the story of two unhappily married people in New York City who begin extramarital affairs. The film, which featured an ensemble cast including Amitabh Bachchan, Preity Zinta, Abhishek Bachchan, Rani Mukerji and Kirron Kher, emerged as India's highest-grossing film in the overseas market,[113] earning more than ?1.13 billion (US$25.62 million) worldwide.[118] Both his roles in Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna and the action film Don, a remake of the 1978 film of the same name, earned Khan Best Actor nominations at the Filmfare Awards,[137] despite his performance as the titular character in Don being negatively compared to that of Amitabh Bachchan in the original film.[138][139]
"Such great things have happened to such a normal guy like me. I am a nobody who shouldn't have been able to do all this but I have done it. I tell everyone that there's this myth I work for; there is this myth called Shahrukh Khan and I am his employee. I have to live up to that ... I'll do it, I am an actor. But I can't start believing in this myth."
—Khan reflecting in 2007 on his position as the Hindi film industry's top star[140]
In 2007, Khan portrayed a disgraced hockey player who coaches the Indian women's national hockey team to World Cup success in Yash Raj Films' semi-fictional Chak De! India. Bhaichand Patel notes that Khan, who had a background in the sport playing for his university's hockey team,[141] essentially portrayed himself as a "cosmopolitan, liberal, Indian Muslim".[142] Faring well in both India and abroad,[118][143] Khan garnered another Filmfare Award for Best Actor for his performance,[61] which Rajeev Masand of CNN-IBN considers to have been "without any of his typical trappings, without any of his trademark quirks", portraying Kabir Khan "like a real flesh-and-blood human being".[144] Filmfare included his performance in their 2010 issue of the "Top 80 Iconic Performances".[145] In the same year, Khan starred alongside Arjun Rampal, Deepika Padukone and Shreyas Talpade in Farah Khan's reincarnation melodrama Om Shanti Om, portraying a 1970s junior artiste who is reborn as a 2000s era superstar. The film became the highest grossing Indian motion picture of 2007, both domestically and abroad.[113][146] Om Shanti Om earned Khan his second nomination of the year for Best Actor at Filmfare.[147] Khalid Mohammed from Hindustan Times wrote, "the enterprise belongs to Shah Rukh Khan, who tackles comedy, high drama and action with his signature style—spontaneous and intuitively intelligent".[148]
Khan collaborated for the third time with Aditya Chopra on the romantic drama Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi (2008) opposite Anushka Sharma, at that time a newcomer. He played Surinder Sahni, a shy man with low self-esteem, whose love for his young arranged wife (Sharma) causes him to transform himself into Raj, a boisterous alter-ego. Rachel Saltz of The New York Times believed the dual role to have been "tailor-made" for Khan, giving him the opportunity to display his talents,[149] although Deep Contractor from Epilogue thought Khan displayed greater strength in the role of Surinder and weakness in the role of monologue-prone Raj.[150] In December 2008, Khan suffered a shoulder injury while filming a small role in Mudassar Aziz's Dulha Mil Gaya. He underwent extensive physiotherapy sessions at the time but the pain left him almost immobile and he had arthroscopic surgery in February 2009.[151][152] He performed a special appearance in the 2009 film Billu, playing Bollywood superstar Sahir Khan—a fictionalised version of himself, wherein he performed musical item numbers with actresses Kareena Kapoor, Priyanka Chopra, and Deepika Padukone.[153] As head of the film's production company, Red Chillies, Khan made the call to change the title of the film from Billu Barber to Billu after hairdressers across the country complained that the word "barber" was derogatory. The company covered up the offending word on billboards that had already been installed with the original title.[154]
Khan with director Karan Johar and co-star Kajol at an event for My Name Is Khan in 2010
After refusing the role that subsequently went to Anil Kapoor in Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire (2008), Khan began shooting My Name Is Khan (2010), his fourth collaboration with director Karan Johar and his sixth with Kajol.[155] The film is based on a true story and set against the backdrop of perceptions of Islam after the 11 September attacks. Khan plays Rizwan Khan, a Muslim suffering from mild Asperger syndrome who sets out on a journey across America to meet the country's president, in a role that film scholar Stephen Teo sees as a "symbol of assertive rasa values" and another example of Khan representing NRI identity in global Bollywood.[156] To provide an accurate portrayal of a sufferer without disparagement, Khan spent several months researching his role by reading books, watching videos and talking to people affected by the condition.[157][158] Upon release, My Name is Khan became one of the highest grossing Bollywood films of all time outside India,[118][113] and earned Khan his eighth Filmfare Award for Best Actor,[61] equalling the record for the most wins in the category with actor Dilip Kumar.[159] Jay Wesissberg from Variety noted how Khan portrayed the Asperger's sufferer with "averted eyes, springy steps, [and] stuttered repetitions of memorized texts", believing it to have been a "standout performance sure to receive the Autism Society's gold seal of approval".[160]
In 2011, Khan starred alongside Arjun Rampal and Kareena Kapoor in Anubhav Sinha's superhero film Ra.One, his first work in this subgenre, as a favour to his children.[161] The film follows the story of a London-based videogame designer who creates a villainous character who escapes into the real world. It was billed as Bollywood's most expensive production; it had an estimated budget of ?1.25 billion (US$26.78 million).[162][163] Despite negative media coverage of the film's box office performance, Ra.One was a financial success with a gross of ?2.4 billion (US$51.42 million).[164][165] The film, and Khan's portrayal of a dual role, received mixed reviews; while most critics praised his performance as the robotic superhero G.One, though they criticised his portrayal of the videogame designer Shekhar.[166] Khan's second release of 2011 was Don 2, a sequel to Don (2006).[167] To prepare for his role, Khan exercised extensively and performed most of the stunts himself.[168] His performance earned him positive reviews from critics; Nikhat Kazmi of The Times of India said, "Shah Rukh remains in command and never loses his foothold, neither through the dramatic sequences nor through the action cuts".[169] The year's highest grossing Bollywood production abroad,[170][171] it was showcased at the 62nd Berlin International Film Festival.