Actor Tom Alter feels that IPL represents what has gone wrong with cricket; says something beautiful has become crass

Caroline D’Cruz (BOMBAY TIMES; April 16, 2012)

 

Veteran actor Tom Alter hates stereotypes and the fact that people still remember the negative roles he played on screen. “Those negative roles constitute only about 5% of the films I’ve done. I have been about 350 films and all types of characters in them,” he asserts. One would expect the affable actor to talk some more about films and theatre, but that again, would be stereotypical, of course. So instead, the actor picks up a very unlikely subject — the Indian Premiere League. “It’s all about greed and revenge…,” he says.

He further says, “I cannot stand the IPL. It’s my personal opinion, but it’s all about greed and revenge, I feel revenge against Kapil Dev, because he started the ICL, and greed, because they wanted more and more money. It represents what has gone wrong with cricket. Something very beautiful, like cricket, has become very crass. Some people who are needy have become greedy and now we have things in cricket that we don’t need. We have gone way beyond cricket. The IPL is nothing about need,” says the actor.

Commenting on Dhoni’s 700 crore contract Tom says, “You’ve got people like Dhoni saying, ‘this time the TRPs will be better’. Is he talking about a TV show or cricket? Someone like Dhoni has obviously been told to say such a thing. There were four coloured pages in the newspaper dedicated to the IPL recently, and one small corner had this brilliant test match between the West Indies and Australia, but no one knew about it. Such a small space dedicated to a tremendous effort by the West Indies team… They almost beat Australia and it marks their comeback as a great side. IPL has overshadowed cricket. A great man like Dhoni saying stuff about TRPs is amazing…Woh kya koi journalist hai TV ka? Kya woh reporter hai koi? He’s got a 700 crore contract, why does he need to play in the IPL? The young players coming up, they get paid well even in the Ranji trophy, whereas the money in the IPL is all concocted PR money. Whether you win or lose, you get the money; in the Ranji, you get the money when you win. So it’s all about greed and no one wants to really work,” Alter says.

Talking about acting, he had said long ago that he would like to be Rajesh Khanna. “I would still like to be Rajesh Khanna. For me he was the hero. He was the ultimate superstar and no one has gotten close to that charm and magnetism. It didn’t last for too long — only lasted five years — but those five years were incredible. He’s my favourite and no one came close to that. Amitabh Bachchan is a great actor, he is supreme, his is a long innings and he is still going strong but his first two successful films had Rajesh Khanna in them — Anand and Namak Haram. Even Amitabh admits he owes much of his success to this man.”