In My Father, The Villain, a biography of Madan Puri by his son, Lt Col Kamlesh Puri, the actor makes a humorous but telling observation about the movie business. “Madan Bauji once told Randhir Kapoor, ‘Movies run on the stars and the producers. The rest of the cast is only required to fill in the blanks. We are like the Aloo-Pyaaz that can be put into any dish,’” writes Kamlesh Puri.
Madan Puri, who died in 1989, did not like being typecast as a villain, but he portrayed menace on the screen like few others. His first success as the embodiment of maleficence was in Vidya (1948), starring Dev Anand and Suraiya. One of his most iconic roles is as a Chinese crook in three noir thrillers by Shakti Samanta in the 1950s. “I have always thought of Madan Puri as the quintessential Chinaman,” writes journalist Sidharth Bhatia in the foreword to My Father, The Villain. “In the 1950s, Shakti Samanta, who went on to make soft romantic films such as Aradhana, Kati Patang and Amar Prem, was known as a director of Noir-ish crime films...Two of the best in the series were Howrah Bridge and China Town, both set in Calcutta. In between there was a third film, the not so well known Singapore. Madan Puri played John Wong in the first, Chang in the second and Joseph Wang in the third. A lesser actor would have merely played them all the same way. Not Madan Puri, who brought subtle changes in inflexion and body language to each one of these characters.”
Puri rehearsed his dialogue “in front of the mirror while sitting on the carpet and shaving”, Lt Col Puri recalls. “Most of his life at home was spent on the living-room carpet, which was office, reception area, dining room and bedroom all in one.” Puri may not have liked being known as a villain, but he made a very effective one. In Yash Chopra’s seminal Deewar (1975), he memorably plays Samant, a smuggler who is the rival of Amitabh Bachchan’s mob boss Davar, played by Iftekhar.
When not breaking up families and upsetting the social order, Puri also appeared in a range of paternalistic roles. One of his best-known performances is in the Rajshri Productions hit, Dulhan Wahi Jo Piya Man Bhaye (1977). This three-hankie love story, starring Sachin and Rameshwari, features Puri as the family patriarch who wants his grandson to marry a humble flower seller rather than the ditzy model for whom he has fallen.
Puri appeared in 24 films starring Shashi Kapoor, whom he knew from his childhood in Mumbai’s Matunga neighbourhood. The Puris and the Kapoors were neighbours on the street officially known as RP Masani Road and unofficially as ‘Punjabi Galli’ and ‘Hollywood Lane.’ Among the films in which Puri provides a foil to Shashi Kapoor’s star power is the hit comedy Chor Machaye Shor (1974).
In Vijay Anand’s Black Mail (1973), made in a decade in which Indian scientists were busy inventing various “formulas”, Puri plays Khurana, who has discovered how to create electricity out of sunlight.
In the 1970s, Puri was one of the busiest character actors in the business, says his son. “At one time he had twenty-two movies on the sets, while his good friend Shatrughan Sinha had twenty-seven. In the industry the saying was that if you want to make a movie, then all that you need is an Arriflex camera, some raw stock and Madan Puri,” Lt Col Puri writes.
