The requiem for Ramsay's horror

The disembodied zombies of the season’s word-of-mouth-hit, Go Goa Gone, can’t but remind us of the lords of horror in India — the Ramsay brothers, who entertained and horrified millions much before special effects and lifelike props made their once-scary monsters look like something the cat dragged in. Google the name ‘Ramsay brothers’ and a listing with all possible contact numbers and email addresses of Tulsi Ramsay, one of seven siblings that made up the Ramsay Brothers, pops up everywhere.

It’s clear he wants to be found. A phone call to request an interview, and there is excitement in Tulsi Ramsay’s voice. “Yes! Of course. Do you know where I live?” He calls on the day of the meeting, to confirm if the interview is still on. “Sometimes, people forget,” he says, by way of explanation. At the lobby of the high-rise Ramsay lives in (where Hema Malini, Sunny Deol, Akshay Kumar’s mother and sister also have flats, he says), teenagers fan themselves while waiting for drivers to bring cars; a struggling actor, script in his hand, talks animatedly on the phone; a bunch of nannies take kids to the pool, and a production crew steps out discussing edits. Inside his 15th floor apartment, the almost 69-year-old Tulsi Ramsay sits in a corner of his cream, brown and gold couch, nervous. Very odd for someone who’s made it his business to scare others.

Introduction to cinema
“Are you speaking only to me?” he asks with hesitation. “Yes.” “Oh, there was a journalist who interviewed me and then went and spoke to others,” he says. He has next to him, an old, grey plastic briefcase from which he removes a document and hands it over. It’s an introduction to his production house, and his resume. Tulsi is clearly nostalgic about the good old days, with good reason perhaps. His father Fatehchand U Ramsinghani moved to Mumbai from Karachi after Partition and started an electronics business on Lamington Road. When the industry wasn’t doing too well, he started looking at the movie business. When his second film Rustom Sohrab (1963), a historical epic, did well, Ramsay Sr decided to stay in the business.

But the Ramsays really took off in the ’70s and ’80s when they churned out their signature, low-budget horror films, most of which were panned by anyone with any sense of aesthetics. But that hardly mattered — the audience the films were intended for loved it.

Discovering horror
Throughout the three-hour interview, one gets the sense that Tulsi knows what journalists are looking for. He almost anticipates the questions and eagerly delivers one anecdote after another.

He narrates one on how he and his brothers convinced their father to produce horror films.

When FU Ramsay’s third film Ek Nanhi Munni Ladki Thi (1970), starring Prithviraj Kapoor, didn’t do very well, brothers Tulsi and Shyam visited a theatre to gauge the audience’s reaction.
 

That’s when they realised a 10 minute sequence in which Prithviraj Kapoor went to a museum to steal a dagger that belonged to his ancestors got the loudest cheers. In the scene, the actor wore an elaborate costume comprising eight inch boots, a scary mask, a cape and a furry costume inside which he was wearing an armour. “He looked just like a monster. When the police shoot at him, the bullets bounce off and people around look shocked and scared. The audience loved it,” says Tulsi. The brothers then convinced their father to focus on horror.

Tulsi drops names of the famous stars who he worked with. “Shatrughan Sinha started out with us in Ek Nanni Munhi Ladki Thi. Kishore Kumar loved our films. He would have a lot of fun in recordings. Once, he came to the studio with fake vampire teeth and refused to take them off till the end of the recording. Another time, we went to his house and he refused to come out and was making scary sounds instead.” Those were the times when Rekha would visit the sets in Mahabaleshwar, where most of the films were shot. “Rekha would come just watch Kiran Kumar.

They had a romance going, he was so handsome, so attractive. Now, she is still so glamorous and he is an old man,” laughs Tulsi.

After the high of the ‘70s and ‘80s, Ramsay produced five shows for Zee TV. The insanely popular Zee Horror Show ran for seven years with record TRPs. But now Tulsi’s clearly hungry for another break. When he realises dna is part of the Essel Group that also owns Zee, he insists we write about his association with Zee and Subhash Chandra, chairman, Essel Group and Zee. “You must write about Subhashji and my association. He was a mastermind, I tell you. If you do, the story will go big,” he says, helpfully.

At their peak
Talking about the Ramsay focus on horror, Tulsi states the obvious: “It (horror) was our USP. We started it. People lapped it up. It’s what made us. There was sex, drama, songs in between the horror.” He narrates an incident in which one of their most popular films gave a big-budget Bachchan film a run for its money in the early ’80s. “Our cult film Purana Mandir released on the same day as the big budget Bachchan (Amitabh) starrer Laawaris. We were in Delhi then and we saw people lining up for our film. No one wanted to watch Laawaris. We couldn’t enter the theatre to watch our own film. Indira Gandhi was killed few days later and there was a bandh. Two days later, theatres were packed again. It was the second biggest hit of 1984,” he says. The success of their films at the time is still paying off. “It still runs our kitchens,” says Tulsi. 

The fall and the hunger to rise
The lull came because of an overkill of Ramsay-style horror. “People overdid it. After us, several people started to make bad horror films and every channel picked up the horror show idea. The audiences got sick of it.” But has he retired yet? No, he quickly responds. “I am going to start a project in a month or so. But I won’t tell you details. People nowadays copy your ideas If I tell you now, tomorrow someone will shoot it in two days and it will be showing in a four-part series on some channel,” he says. His phone rings in between, he answers and says, “I can’t talk right now.

I am in a very, very important meeting… No, no, you don’t get it. Yeh bahut zaroori hai mere liye, aap kal phone karna.” He hangs up and says: “I want to go out with a bang. I want to be remembered.” “Will you let me know when this will be out? This Sunday? I’ll buy some extra copies. Thank you for your time,” he concludes, looking relaxed for the first time in three hours.

What’s in a name?
Fatehchand U Ramsinghani ran an electronics store in Karachi before Independence. He was a radio engineer and foreigners who visited the store mangled his surname. “My father then realised that foreigners had a problem pronouncing Ramsinghani and changed his surname and the name of the shop to Ramsay,” says Tulsi Ramsay.

Radio dealers to movie makers
FU Ramsay moved to Bombay after Partition with his wife and four sons and two daughters. Three more sons were born in India. Ramsay Sr re-established his shop on Mumbai’s Lamington Road and became a dealer of the famous Murphy Radio. When the electronics business was doing badly, he decided to give the movie business a shot. He co-produced Shaheed-E-Azam Bhagat Singh in 1954. It was India’s first film on the martyr but it didn’t do too well. “India had just gained Independence and people didn’t care much about Bhagat Singh,” says Tulsi.  His second film, Rustom Sohrab (1963), was a historical epic. It did well and Ramsay Sr decided to stay in the business.
 
All in the family
In the 1950s, to be part of a film crew, one had to be a member of the film workers’ union. “So my father decided to enroll us into the union keeping in mind our interests and talents,” says Tulsi Ramsay. Gangu was a good photographer so he was enrolled as an assistant to a cinematographer, Keshu assisted Gangu. Kiran liked music, so he got to be the sound assistant, and Kumar, “a double graduate,” was the screenwriter Shyam and Tulsi were directors and Arjun worked on edits. The crew of seven brothers were then recognised as the Ramsay Brothers.
 
Tiffin box productions
FU Ramsay wanted to train his sons in all aspects of filmmaking. So he took them to Kashmir for a workshop. “We hired a houseboat on the Jhelum and held a four-month long workshop where our father trained us in various aspects of filmmaking. We read books, discussed plots and practiced cinematography,” says Tulsi. Post the workshop, the brothers set out to do what was then unheard of in Indian Cinema. They boarded a bus with unknown actors and family members who doubled up as crew and went to Mahabaleshwar to shoot Do Gaz Zameen Ke Neeche. They lived in a government guesthouse and shot on location so they saved on the cost to put up a set.

The ladies in the family cooked for the crew and helped with make-up and the costumes came from their own or the actors’ wardrobes. The film was shot in a 40-day schedule. “My father called it Tiffin Box Productions. He said jab ghar mein khana bana sakte hain, toh hotel se kyun mangayein,” says Tulsi. The film was a rage at the box office and the brothers repeated this model to make over 30 superhit films