‘Adman Madman’, Prahlad Kakar’s memoirs: Ad world through lens of an insider

Nonika Singh

The title might be beguiling. One of India’s most significant ad gurus, Prahlad Kakar might have earned the sobriquet of ‘madman’, but right from the start, you know it’s a sane voice speaking, even when dipped in humour, irreverence and nostalgia. Kakar’s autobiography or memoirs, if you will, begins on a naughty note from early childhood. The same impishness is maintained all through as he takes us through the crests and troughs of his remarkable journey in which more than one experience shaped his life path.

The book perks up when veteran director Shyam Benegal, with whom Kakar began his advertising career, appears in the picture. ‘Ankur’, ‘Nishant’, ‘Manthan’, ‘Bhumika’… we go behind the scenes of stellar movies. This is also when names of important people, aspirants back then and celebrities now, begin to appear in his writing. Not as name-dropping but as markers in their life and his. Kakar not only recalls the moment when a 19-year-old Shabana Azmi first walked into their office, but also his fan-boy moment when he nursed her injured toe to health. Kakar is a master storyteller and it is evident as he regales with anecdote after anecdote. He tells with much glee what a petulant kid actor Jugal Hansraj was. As is how they literally kidnapped actor Rose when she refused to show up for the shoot.

Kakar delights with the same uncanny sense of timing that has marked his advertising campaigns. He knows when to build up drama and when to deliver the punch. As he goes on to describe his popular advertisements with vivid details, it gets a tad taxing at times, but just then he springs a name or an incident and has all your attention. The man who has given us timeless adverts with one-liners that ring a bell even today, knows how not to lose his readers. Humour is certainly his armour and he uses it with panache. How the pet python Snoopy, whom they acquired for the Bombay Dyeing ad, landed up on actor Satish Shah’s mother’s stomach is so hilarious that you actually die laughing and forget the gravity of the incident. More than one situation is laden with mirth. But if you think creating an ad is all fun and games or simply a medley of catchy punch-lines, married with good-looking models, well, read on.

Kakar opens the doors to the hurly-burly world of advertising, which is as arduous as feature filmmaking, if not more. Right from casting to scouting locations to creating a story, it’s an art form with commerce writ all over it. What’s more (or worse), it has to please both clients and viewers, either of whom can throw innovation straight into the dustbin, from which he, interestingly, retrieved many ideas.

Yes, much of the credit as to how the face of advertisement began to change in India goes to ‘Yours Truly’, which is how the maverick addresses himself in the book. Much time and reams of pages are spent on extolling his ‘Yehi hai right choice’ Pepsi campaigns, which, besides riding on established stars like Shah Rukh Khan, also gave birth to several like Shahid Kapoor. But he also admits his faux pas and how the ad involving a Hrithik Roshan lookalike fell flat on the face. Somewhere, the true wisdom about what works and what doesn’t filters in his sagacious piece of advice: never over-promise and under-deliver, always under-promise and over-deliver. Since a man is a sum of more than one aspect, other facets of an unapologetic Kakar surface. We quite enjoy the reminisces of his days at Prithvi Café, which buzzed with joie de vivre when he handled it for Jennifer Kendal.

The 500-page book, with his exploits (with women) suitably woven in, is not exactly a page-turner, yet it keeps you invested till the last page. Tempted to pack in as many stories as possible, he is painting the big picture. Success always tastes sweet, but what does it take to get to the point where he can gleefully gloat: c’est la vie (that’s life)! Savour the maddening and equally fascinating world of advertising through the lens of an insider who is as much a catalyst as witness to its dynamics and dynamism.