Amitabh Bachchan wants to play Harivansh Rai Bachchan on screen

Highlights

• If there was one character from a book that Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan would love to bring alive on screen, it would be his father's role from his autobiography, 'In the Afternoon of Time: An Autobiography'.
• During an open question-and-answer session at the Penguin Annual Lecture 2013 in the capital on Friday (November 29, 2013) night, an enthusiastic fan out of an audience of almost a thousand asked Big B to pick one of his beloved characters that he'd like to play in a film.
• He gave it a thought, and said: "Maybe I'd like to play the role that my father played in his autobiography."
• You mean you want to play Harivansh Rai Bachchan, asked the startled host.
• To that, Big B smiled and said: "It's a tough call, but I want to try."
• Amitabh has often shared anecdotes of his celebrated father and it was no different at the event.
• He talked about some of his conversations with his father - in his childhood, during his youth and of those that Amitabh shared with Harivansh Rai during his last days in 2003.
• Harivansh Rai Bachchan, who died in 2003, is credited with works like 'Madhushala', 'Madhukalash', 'Madhubala' and 'Agneepath'.
• Amitabh said his father once told him he was his "greatest poetry".
• But "I do not know whether I am a free verse or a couplet, a chaupai or a shloka."
• "I wish I had asked. Now it is too late," he lamented even as he proudly recited some verses from his father's 'Madhushala' in his distinct baritone at the behest of the audience.
• What followed obviously was loud applause.