The maiden episode of Season 8 of Koffee with Karan is unlike any of the countless others aired in the last 19 years. Several celebrity couples have appeared on the show in the past two decades and fielded Karan Johar’s decidedly pointed, personal questions ranging from their underwear to sex lives. All of it intended to be risqué, salacious. The show, which was thus far comfortable being a “guilty pleasure” celebrated for its many scandals and little substance, seems to have had a change of heart.
After a painfully pretentious and performative last two seasons, Koffee with Karan has returned sooner than ever, with Johar conceding to have taken all the criticism seriously, promising more meat than masala this time. Turns out, he means it. The pilot episode of the new season, featuring a dazzling Deepika Padukone and Ranveer Singh, is KWK at its most heartfelt, vulnerable. That is not to say that the sheen has tapered off to show the cracks, even if it’s just a weeny bit. Koffee with Karan cannot get so out of character; it would be blasphemous. All of it is still a master performance, a glorious spectacle but Johar has mercifully moved on from petty KWK staples such as “hook, marry, kill” or “who would you rather?”
He instead talks to Padukone and Singh about stories that matter, details that their fans have been thirsting for but hadn’t been made privy to, yet. The power couple discuss at great length their courtship, how they won over Padukone’s parents, their secret engagement, the fiercely private wedding overlooking a picturesque Italian lake, Padukone’s battle with depression, Singh’s role as a partner and caregiver, his sartorial turnaround, and the spate of recent failures before his resurrection, courtesy his explosive performance in Johar’s recent Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani.
Known for not divulging too much of their personal life in public, the actors broke out of character and did something they hadn’t until now—share exclusive footage of their picturesque nuptial festivities. It is expectedly dreamy, beautifully manufactured, the kind that is sure to elicit the desired response. However, in the video, when talking about how she’s feeling in the moment, Padukone says “complete” thrice and beams a smile so pristine and precious as that of an infant too new, too oblivious to the world, you cannot not be moved.
It is so affecting that it reduces Johar to a mushy pulp, making him confess that he misses having such a fulfilling romantic relationship and having his own person whom he can wake up next to, hold hands with, and share his life with its many joys and sorrows. Despite being the unrivalled showman that he is, Johar cannot help but tear up at such a magnificent yet intimate display of love, an emotion that he has been trying to stoke and sell for 25 years.
This first episode of season 8 stands out because it features Padukone and Singh like we’ve never seen them before. Both have made several appearances on KWK earlier, each predictably superficial and banal—he’d always be ostentatiously flamboyant, she agonisingly reticent. What, then, changed this time? They have been together for 11 years and married for five. Why appear on Koffee with Karan now as if conjoined?
The element of performance in Padukone and Singh’s appearance and its timing may beget questions but there is no interrogating Johar in this episode. Usually the mischief-maker, he is all heart here. When Singh divulges that he once cleaned out a crab stuck in Padukone’s teeth, in response, Johar keeps on rolling his own tongue over his teeth trying to wrest whatever may or may not be stuck there.
After talking about his struggle with loneliness and depression, his first reaction is, “My mum will be watching this.” To see a 51-year-old media mogul still put his mother front and centre, what’s not to like? More than Bollywood’s superstar couple, it is because of Johar that the pilot episode stands out and will be talked about and remembered.
Though he has done away with the buzzer and the coffee quiz, Johar has introduced another pastime just as bovine—the imposter challenge. If I may ask, who, for the love of god, decides the games on this show?
First Published: Oct 26, 2023 9:08 PM IST
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