SRK: I am anxious/ 24 January, 2007

I am anxious'
Gayatri Jayaraman
[24 Jan, 2007 l 2122 hrs ISTlTIMES NEWS NETWORK]

Shah Rukh Khan on his show and his supposed war with Amitabh Bachchan.

King Khan's life has come full circle — after Fauji and Circus, and big screen blockbusters in between — Shah Rukh Khan's back on TV with a reality show, but says his nerves aren't any steelier.

So, are you nervous, confident or over confident?

I am anxious. Everybody thinks I am pompous but that's a just a front for me. For me it's the creative process. You create something in isolation and when it is exposed, there is a huge explosion of public opinion. In the film industry, I know where I'm headed. Here, I don't know.

Are you coping with the obvious comparisons?

There has been hype, pressure, comparisons with this other gentleman that I am not comfortable talking about. But what really hurts me are the SMSs.

SMSs?

That newspapers carry in reader's polls. When a Geetika from Bhayander says 'SRK sucks' that really hurts me. I read them all. The good and the bad. It's like a pimple on the face. You don't notice the rest of the face, but the pimple you do.

You work hard to shield the kids?

Yes. But my kids have sensed that I am anxious. So they are doing something they have never done before – they drop by the sets and linger around, when I'm doing my make up, sometimes all day. They've never done that in all these years. I think children are the first to sense these things. Mine feel they need to be there for me.

Is there any truth to 'SRK vs Bachchan'?

He's an accomplished gentleman who's 64, and I am where I am, and at the stage where I am the comparison is not fair to him at all.