The success story

Rajesh Hamal, also known as Mahanayak of Nepali film industry, started his career with the movie, Yug Dekhi Yug Samma, and till now he is ruling the industry, continuously. During that period, many talented actors and actresses raised to fame and everyone expected the newcomers to replace Rajesh Hamal. But, none of them could show their magic. Their fame was short lived and couldn’t sustain for long in the top position. For example: Sushil Chettri, Ramesh Upreti, Nikhil Upreti, and Saroj Khanal were considered to be candidate for the next superstar in Nepali film industry. But, their craze dwindled after a short time. At the same time, craze of Rajesh Hamal is still as huge as ever in Nepali movie industry.

It’s not that there were no downs in his career.

A few reason for his successful career are:

• Great acting (I am a great fan of his acting.)
• Looks and physique
• Versatile acting – good in all types of roles like action, romance, comedy and dancing.

In Nepali films, most of the actors are recognized due to their action skills who get chance to improve their acting skills later. But, in case of Rajesh Hamal, he was good from the start – he has done very good job in Yug Dekhi Yug Samma. His educational background is also rare among Nepali actors.

The YES man

Survey of Nepali movies released in the last 20 years show that maximum number of movies feature Rajesh Hamal. If he is not in the leading role,  he might be acting with other actors like Nikhil Upreti, Biraj Bhatt or with new faces. This is because of the craze of Rajesh Hamal among the Nepali film viewers. It might also be because Rajesh Hamal doesn’t reject any proposal. I haven’t heard from him, but it seems, Rajesh Hamal doesn’t choose the movies based on the story, script, film crew member and the producer.

Every new directors and producers willing to pay enough can get Rajesh to play in their movies. That might be the reason why, most of the flop movies feature Rajesh Hamal. That is in sharp contrast with the fact that, maximum number of hit movies also feature Rajesh Hamal.

The maximum number of flop movies that featured Rajesh Hamal, either lack good story and script or has a new director or producer. The only strength of such movies are star cast, action, and glamorous scenes.

Impact in the Nepali Movie Industry

The fact that Rajesh Hamal doesn’t reject any movie, was favorable for new producers or directors as they can have the superstar in their debut movies. When a star like Rajesh Hamal sign-in a movie, it also becomes easy for the directors and producers to attract other top ranking actors in the movie. That way, Rajesh helped a few talented newbie get established in the Nepali movie industry. But the majority of the producers and directors with movies in which Rajesh Hamal was the only attraction got booted by the viewers.

When Rajesh started signing all the movies he got, it also became an unwritten norm in the industry. Other actors also thought: signing more movies can help to be a top actor. Today’s young and talented actors like Aryan Sigdel, Babu Bogati, and Raj Ballav Koirala are also following this trend to act in as many movie as they can get.

Conclusion

Rajesh Hamal is still capable of making the movie he acts, a hit. If he had used that caliber properly, he could have avoided at least 40% of the flop movies. Although he is considered the superstar by the media only 25% of his movies were hit and rest were flop movies. Most of the producers and directors of his flop movies were inexperienced and were only using Rajesh’s name to sell the movie.

My suggestion to the new actors and old actors is, not to follow Rajesh’s method of selecting movies. A few good movies is better than a lot of flops and it will also help in uplifting our film industry.