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All that jazz

Shiamak Davar. Click for bigger pic!

His CV reads like a true performer's. His expertise covers the varied areas of singing, dancing, choreographing, acting and even model improvement. For Shiamak Davar, the end of 1997 was simply great. He turned movie choreographer with Yash Chopra's Dil To Pagal Hai, his new Hindi album Mohabbat Kar Le was released, and his protégée of sorts, Diana Hayden, walked away with the Miss World title in Seychelles.

Based in Bombay, he has been knocking at the doors of critical acclaim for long. Introduced to the world of theatre by Alyque Padamsee, with the lead role of Che Guevara in Evita, he ran through a clutch of well-received plays. But jazz dancing -- 'please don't call it aerobics' -- remained his passion, and he even opened the grandiosely titled Shiamak Davar Institute for Performing Arts, which churns out performers of all ages and shapes with metronomic regularity.

His music album, Survive, with which he paraded his singing talent, did not set the Arabian Sea afire, but he isn't complaining. His second album, this time in Hindi, is courtesy Polygram. And though his work in DTPH has been noticed and duly appreciated, he is not too keen on more Bollywood offers. In the meantime, theatre beckons, and he returns to the proscenium later this year. In this conversation with Saisuresh Sivaswamy, he unspools his life, his love -- no, not dancing, but music.

So how did the story of the Parsi answer to John Travolta begin?

I was always interested in the performing arts, from the age of god, must be five or six or seven. There was a piano in my old house which my cousin Bunty would play. I would sing with her and learn. I really used to love this girl.

After she went abroad, I shifted to the piano and started singing myself. I would sing and play, everything on the piano, making up songs. People think of me as a dancer and a choreographer, but I don't think of myself as one or the other. It's like, on the face you have to have the eyes, the nose and mouth. To eat, to smell, to look. For me it's a combination, I cannot do, sing only without moving my body and expressing with my face. I cannot act if I don't....I have to do everything together

But do you prefer dancing to performing?

I can sing, dance, act and choreograph and direct which sounds pompous but is not. It's just that I do have these talents and one complements the other, one does not go without the other, all three go together. That's a very important thing. People should know this, they say you are a dancer. But when I say I am a singer, they get confused. But I have been singing from that time.

I make up my own music, play the piano like Billy Joel and Elton John and make up my own music and sing. Dancing, I used to dance at parties, at social and all these competitions, and became, with my girlfriend a little kind of a -- what do you say -- famous couple. We used to go and dance everywhere.

Were you self-taught, or did you undergo training?

Self-taught, of course. We had no dancing schools then, and if we did we had only ballet schools. J J Rodriguez was only ballroom, you see. He was not jazz or funk or disco or rap. So I never got into a school really. But after that I went abroad and learnt in places with classes all over and came back to start my own school.

I started with about seven-eight people... my friends, cousins... Stuff like that. This must have been in... I can't remember, around 12 years ago. And then it grew. I was apprehensive about starting classes but I was guided by Vispy Bhavnagri who is not here with us any longer...

Karisma Kapoor in a song choreographed by Davar in Dil to Pagal Hai. Click for bigger pic!

I really do believe in working hard. My parents were the most phenomenal parents I have seen in my life, I tell you I must be having some amazing karma, good karma to have such parents. For they have always encouraged me, they never stopped me. They were always happy that I was singing, dancing... But they were nervous about what I would do in the future, that I wouldn't be doing Davar's College...

So your family owns that famous institute.

It is a partnership and my father is a partner... Anyway, that's what I did. Then I opened my school, Shiamak Davar's Institute of the Performing Arts. We concentrate on dancing now, but just recently we introduced acting workshops and other kind of folk dance workshops. We incorporate different segments of work so people can have the total picture instead of jazz only.

I love theatre. In Evita I played Che opposite Sharon Prabhakar. And in Greased Lightning I played Danny... I had a really great time. It was my first singing role, and I was really too impressed, too happy. I loved it. For I was singing, my main love. I then did many other plays, many other shows.

A very interesting show I did was the French Festival of India, for the government, where 100,000 people came. It was spectacular. I worked with a French choreographer called Jiji, and I worked with French dancers who were very talented. I used my other Indian dancers who were fantastic.

Then I performed at the Asian track and field events in Delhi, where I choreographed 1,100 people. That was a really petrifying experience for me but, by the grace of god, I got through that. I loved the national games because I sang a song called Raju composed by me, the lyrics were by Bharat Dabholkar.

Raju was the mascot, so I sang, 'Come on Raju come on, tu hai Bharat mata ki shaan.' I repeated it recently at the Police Games. It was a hit at the National Games. Lata Mangeshkar was singing it, I was singing it, everybody was singing it, and the song was so popular, I had to sing in Hindi and Marathi, and it was so good that by the grace of God, I was called for the closing ceremony as well.

Is it tough being a male dancer?

It is very tough being a male dancer, because people think that when a man dances he is effeminate. The problem is people don't know how tough we are. Physically, not in the sense of body-building; we are talking about toughness as in strength. A different kind of strength. Dancing non-stop on stage for two hours requires a lot of stamina and lot of strength. And I sing and dance. So people can't say, 'It's so easy, no big deal.' It is a very tough thing.

My question was in terms of government patronage etc. Is it tougher for a male dancer to succeed, than it is for a woman?

Oh, I don't know about that. I have done a lot of government shows... I am happy at least they used me for my singing and dancing. And they really respect my work, I have seen that, for most of the work I have done for the government only, the French Festival, the National Games, the Police Games, the World Chess Championships, the 100 years of cinema meet, the Asian track and field competition...

I really had to work hard to achieve this. I'm still not successful in the sense that everybody on the road doesn't know me. It's been a tough success. It's not like 'Oh Shiamak, you were born with a silver spoon in your mouth.' No, I had to undergo a lot to get where I am. It has taken me 10 to 12 years of really hard work to be appreciated.

Click for bigger pic!

Nowadays, you know, they do 10 videos and they come on screen... It wasn't so simple for me.

You know, a lot of people tell me I should be abroad. But I tell them, no, I can make my name here, here's where the people need me. I want to train Indian people first.... These people who say you are so talented, they won't ever use my talent. They just talk. That's why, when the people at Polygram approached me, I was touched.

For after my deal with HMV, it was a little difficult to get a deal with an album company, because they would say, "Oh, you can't sing in Hindi... But I have proved myself, I have sung in Hindi. In all my shows the last song is always a Hindi medley. Probably some of them were nervous, not interested, fair enough. And that's why I am grateful to Yash Chopra, for he has give me a lot of respect, a lot of love, and a lot of guidance...

How did you come to do Dil To Pagal Hai?

Actually Yash uncle had asked me to do Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge years ago, but I was nervous and scared. I want to give quality and not quantity. And that was when I was developing my school. I was concentrating on that and my album, Survive.

Afterwards I felt, 'Yes, yes, I will do it.' Then we discussed everything. and... Fantastic! You know, when I see my movie now, when I go and see in the theatres I get, I really choke in my throat because it's so... the memories are amazing.

It was also a very uncommon in the sense it had two choreographers?

Yeah, they also had Farah Khan, but I had no problems about it. In fact my new video is being choreographed by her. I don't care. I believe if people who are talented work together, and if you are secure in your heart and I am secure in mine, people can make magic together. Now Farah was asked to do some songs, I have no problem. Why should I have a problem?

Was it like when you did something, she changed it... Things like that?

No, no, no. She did her songs, and I did mine. And Adi (director Aditya Chopra) and Yash uncle dealt with her and me, separately. In fact, we never even met, Farah and me. We only met at the private screening.

She has a been a film choreographer of long standing, whereas you were a first-timer to the medium. So did you feel a little nervous about, maybe, being overshadowed?

Today you may be a big superstar while I am not. I will always be nervous and tense, for that's my nature. I never take anything for granted. I never say because I am a damn good choreographer. I will do damn good films also. Film technique and theatre technique is totally different... So I was a little nervous, yes...

You know, in this film I did a song called Koi Ladki Hai which is actually a street children's song. People love that song, because it was very tapori and... Have you seen that movie? No? Chak dhum dhum, it is extremely tapori, tapori to the core. I did that purposely because I wanted to do something Indian, We had jazz-Indian in the other songs. You can see that song and judge -- people love that song.

'Dancing is a very tough thing'