You know the movie Moneyball? Which talked about the sabarmetric approach to baseball, that allowed every player to be a quantifiable element in a team’s success? So, there is a constant effort to figure out a formula in Indian film that will, somehow, allow filmmakers to predict which stars will give them a hit.
Bollywoodhungama came out with a score card for 2015 for actors based on box office. Which is always hard to balance. They tried using two different scores, but ended up with completely contradictory results.
What is the best way to measure the star power of a Shahrukh Khan versus an Akshay Kumar? And who really won 2015?
Bollywoodhungama is all about the box office. They had two lists, taking into account box office receipts only. First, they looked at cumulative box office for the year, the total of every ticket sold for every movie a particular actor did in 2015. On that list, the top five were:
- Salman Khan-530.50 crore
- Akshay Kumar-355.53 crore
- Varun Dhawan-305.81 crore
- Ranveer Singh-256.88 crore
- Anil Kapoor-173.57 crore
Salman Khan, absolutely, anybody in India can tell you that he is a powerhouse who can guarantee a good opening for a film. And the rest of the list looks sort of reasonable, until you realize who isn’t on it. No SHAHRUKH!!! Which is shocking, not just as a Shahrukh fan, but as an industry analyst. Shahrukh is actually 7th on this list. But he is definitely not the 7th most powerful figure in the Indian industry, or your 7th choice if you want a hit film.
So, what went wrong? Well, first, this is a cumulative list. Akshay Kumar, the hardest working man in Indian film, released FIVE movies in 2015. So his 355.53 crore, split 5 ways, give him an average of only 71 crore per film. Not great. Shahrukh only released one film, which was a blockbuster hit, but he can’t compete on the same level with stars who just plain worked more.
Bollywoodhungama realized this problem, so they created a second list that splits the profits by number of releases. This list is closer, but it is still missing some moving parts. It drops Akshay and Anil down to a more reasonable #8 and #9. Number 1 through 5 now becomes:
- Salman Khan-262.25 crore
- R. Madhavan-152.39 crore
- Shahrukh Khan-150 crore
- Ranveer Singh-128.44 crore
- Varun Dhawan-101.9 crore
At least Shahrukh made the top 5. But according to this, Madhavan is a better bet and a more successful actor than him. Freaking Madhavan!!! Who I love, and he does has his appeal, and he is a good actor. But he is the most egregious example of giving credit where credit is NOT due. He only had one release in 2015, Tanu Weds Manu Returns, and that was Kangana’s movie. She should be on this list, not him. In the same way, on both lists, Varun is getting credit for Dilwale. He was great in it, sure, but Dilwale did not have a box office take of 150 crore because Varun Dhawan was in it.
This problem was even worse on the cumulative list. Dil Dhadekna Do, for instance, was being counted twice, once for Ranveer and once for Anil, and driving both of them into the top 5, when really the success of that film was not owed to either of them, or really to any one actor who was in it. The simplest solution is to eliminate such ensemble pieces entirely and only look at films which, subjectively, you can say were only successes due to the presence of this particular actor. In that case, Ranveer, for instance, would actually have no releases this year, as both DDD and Bajirao were really hits based on their directors’ vision and the full ensemble cast, rather than his star power (not saying he wasn’t great in them, just that they could theoretically have done just as well if a different actor had been cast in his role). While Varun would still be able to take credit for ABCD2 and Badlapur, but would lose Dilwale.
Based on this list of top grossers of 2015, if we only look at the films on this list that truly relied on their star to carry it, and if we put preference to stars who made more profit per film rather than cumulatively, we have:
- Salman Khan (Bajrangi Bhaijaan, Prem Ratan Dhan Payo)
- Kangana Ranaut (Tanu Weds Manu Returns)
- Shahrukh Khan (Dilwale)
- Akshay Kumar (Baby and Singh is Bling and Gabbar is Back)
- Varun Dhawan (ABCD2 and Badlapur)
And if you want proof that these metrics actually matter, and that terrible things can happen when they are misinterpreted, just look at Chandni Chowk to China. This was the first movie made by an American studio in India. Warner Bros. learned that stars are important in India, so they used their calculators and came up with Akshay Kumar and Deepika Padukone as the most likely way to get a hit. Akshay was riding high off another string of moderate hits all in one year, and Deepika was coming off of Om Shanti Om. On paper, they both looked like the biggest hit machines in Indian film. And, of course, Chandni Chowk opened like a wet squib. Because, much though I love her now, Deepika was not in anyway responsible for the success of Om Shanti Om and it should not have been counted on her side of the balance sheet. And Akshay, if you divided his hits by the number of releases, was not a winning horse.
(Of course, they also tried to conflate the Asian market into one picture, not realizing that China and India are longtime trading and cultural rivals)
So, Warner Bros, or Fox Searchlight, or whoever else, if you are reading this, the actor you want to cast in your Indian production is Kangana Ranaut (Salman’s awesome, but impossible to work with. You don’t want to mess with that).
dontcallitbollywood 
I’m going to play devil’s advocate with you. Because the point of the movie Moneyball is that you invest in the players who can get base hits. Not necessarily the home run king. And on that metric, maybe someone like Ashkay who just hustles and gets modest box office over and over again is a worthy bet. Also, I do think Ranveer, while in ensemble pieces, IS a reason some younger ticket buyers went to the theater, if my tumblr feed is anything to go by. I didn’t go to watch DDD for Anil Kapoor, because at the time, I didn’t know much about him.
But what I totally agree with is that Kangana should be on the list rather than Madhavan (even if he was the main reason I bought MY ticket!) This list is skewed without Kangana and Deepika and Kajol.
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I wonder if there are two different types of decisions people might be making. In Moneyball, you’d be picking a player that would play ever game all season (or until you decide to trade him). So you are getting credit for Akshay Kumar over the course of the whole year’s worth of pictures. This would be like being an agent for a star, maybe? Or a product hiring a star to endorse it for the year? In which case Akshay Kumar would be a great choice, you know you’d have a solid stream of income over time.
On the other hand, if I’m making just one movie and putting all my eggs in one basket, then this cumulative effect does nothing for me. That’s where you probably want a home run king. Well, at least someone who won’t strike out terribly. Maybe we also need to be looking at who produces dud box offices and taking that into account? Am I getting to serious about finding a mathematical formula for a hypothetical imaginary movie casting decision?
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Getting too serious about this isn’t possible! And you put your finger on the problem, or uniqueness shall we say, of the Indian film industry. 90% of the films are made by one time producers. They need a profit, now, on this one picture, and they don’t care about anything else. For them, the key is finding the one star who can guarantee that for them, hopefully before anyone else notices it so they can still get him cheap. They are looking for your Varun Dhawans, your Ranveer Singhs. Akshay Kumar may average out to a profit, but they aren’t getting him for 5 pictures they can average, they are getting him for one and it needs to be a blockbuster.
But, there are a growing number of solid studios with multiple releases. They can afford to play the game, hire the reliable players and risk a possible loss, assuming it will statistically balance out. Yash Raj and Dharma have been doing this for years (Wake Up Sid, Jhoom Barabar Jhoom, Hasee To Phasee, etc.). And now Excel is getting in the game, DDD hit for them, Wazir isn’t doing as well as it could, but in the end it will all balance out.
And, of course, Bhatt films never looks for the home run, they always look for the base hit. Or, more likely, the walk (they tend to release films on dead weekends, just to make absolutely sure there is no real competition based on quality).
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I guess the more subtle judgement would be, if you are looking for a star turn big blockbuster picture (which WB was with Chandni Chowk, they invested millions and millions in it and it only made back half the budget), then look at my list for the one name you want. But, if you want to see who is a reliable base hitter for your small film, look at Hungama’s second list, box office divided by number of releases in 2015.
Actually, that kind of analysis probably how ABCD2 and DDD landed on these lists. In ABCD2, Varun and Shruti both had decent track records but weren’t major stars, the budget wasn’t extreme, it was a sequel to a successful concept, and they managed to get a hit without paying for a real home-run hitter type of player. With DDD, I wouldn’t be surprised if they picked that ensemble to stack the deck, figuring MovieMavenGal would buy a ticket for Ranveer, I would buy one for Anil Kapoor, someone else is coming in for Farhan, for Priyanka, for Anushka. Instead of getting someone like Salman who will get half of India to buy a ticket just for him, they went with a bunch of people who can each bring in a small proportion of tickets, which will add up to a good total.
But if the question is, which actor, on their own, is the top star of 2015 and can drive the most money to the box office by themselves, I’m still going with Salman, Kangana, and Shahrukh!
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Getting more mathy… So another secret to the success of DDD is picking an ensemble so that you have the right amount of fan spread vs. fan overlap. Say mother, father, grandmother, teenage son, and young daughter are going to see a movie. DDD wants to be a family movies that gets all of them interested. So, their cast covers the spectrum. Grandma goes for Anil, mother goes for Shefali (she is secretly a fan of parallel cinema and subtle acting), father goes for Farhan (he identified with DCH as a young man), son has a crush on sexy Priyanka, young daughter wants to grow up to be Anushka, whatever. And each person maybe knows s/he likes one or two other actors in the movie as well (grandma might also like Shefali from her serial days, daughter thinks Ranveer is cute, etc.).
But you also (I propose) have to be careful about who you don’t cast! For example, intellectual mother might refuse to go to a movie with Salman in it because of his gunda-ness, or teenage son might not go to a movie that has too many “old people” in it. You need to get a cast that everyone in the family is okay with, but you don’t want to waste money including too many of grandma’s favorites. The cast needs to be just broad enough and no broader. Does that sound right? I leave it to more movie-wise people to come up with examples of this being true or false.
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But, the missing element in your fan spread versus overlap concept, is that these are not fixed values. Both in terms of money and popularity.
Take Mission Kashmir. When it was first conceived and cast, it was supposed to be a movie where the plot was the star more than any one person, similar to Wazir. You have a good plot to bring in the fathers and sons, and then Sanjay Dutt for the aunties, Priety for the young modern girls, and this new kid Hrithik who can dance a little to help sell the soundtrack and promote the film.
But by the time it comes out, you lose the fathers, sons, and aunties, and you are just left with the modern girls who are coming to see Hrithik . It turned into a great deal for the filmmakers, they got him dirt cheap and ended up with a big hit. But all the planning of a good actor spread, not to mention actually bothering to write a script and hire decent actors, ended up being meaningless just because Hrithik got wet in a mesh shirt and the whole industry changed two months before their film came out.
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This was really interesting! I found it when I was looking for a possible ABCD 2 review. I especially liked you and your sister’s thoughts about fan spread vs. fan overlap.
Honestly, I love a lot of your posts from your early blogging days since they’re really interesting. But I rarely have the time to go back and look for more posts like this 🙂
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I am strongly tempted to start reposting some of these. Partly because it would be an easy way to keep me on schedule, but also because I know there are people who never saw them when they first came out and won’t be going back through the archives.
What do you think, does that make sense or would it be irritating?
On Sat, Jul 22, 2017 at 10:19 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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I wouldn’t mind. Maybe if it makes sense in context it would be a better idea. Like for example you could repost something that you wrote about Bajirao Mastani when it comes closer to the release of Padmavati.
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I agree with Niki, about the quality of your post(s) and certain comments here and the wish to either get relinked in actual posts or doing a ‘refreshed’ post on the same subject when there is an opportunity 🙂
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Just as an afterthought a question: What do you think about this kind of ranking?
http://www.timescelebex.com/
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I’ve tracked it closely in the past. It’s an interesting idea, looking at the value of creating news versus just box office. Or really, it is tracking their value as “brand ambassadors”. Or launching books or opening jewelry stores or any of those things. How much they can charge for just being themselves, versus acting.
On Wed, Nov 29, 2017 at 6:42 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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Commenting is the best way, when I link to them in the body of a post, very few people click the links to go through. But a fresh comment definitely pulls people’s attention.
On Wed, Nov 29, 2017 at 6:37 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
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