Guru Dutt -Dev Anand : Great Friendships

“That is my shirt….”

Dev Anand must have said that when he saw a young choreographer wearing his shirt. What a coincidence. Star of movie Hum Ek Hain saw a ‘no one’ wearing his shirt. He must have flared up… but no. Dev was calm. He asked the person the secret. Easy guess. Same laundry! The star and choreographer had the same laundryman and he somehow replaced a star shirt with a no-one’s shirt.

Dev Sahab is known as a gentleman by everyone; inside and outside the industry. He was a star. But the person who wore that shirt was not destined to be a no-one. He was destined to be the most respected moviemaker of India. He was Guru Dutt.

Guru Dutt was a struggler then and that led to his big break. The incident made Dev and Guru great friends and they made a promise to each other. If Guru becomes a movie-maker, he will cast Dev and if ever Dev makes a movie, Guru will direct it.

Dev made Baazi and that was directed by Guru. It was a blockbuster. However, Guru was not able to fulfill his promise. He did it indirectly by producing CID starring Dev but directed by Raj Khosla. Another blockbuster. Dev still regrets that he never worked under Guru under Guru’s production house. One prime reason was creative differences between Chetan Anand and Guru Dutt.

Keeping that aside, Dev and Guru were great friends and created two legendary movies. Today when we hear about actors trying to belittle others, stories like this definitely make these legends appear bigger.
 
Written By: Sujoy Ghosh