The Superstar Illness
Amitabh Bachchan
With a celebrity, one wonders whether the attention is on the message or the person. The surrounding spectacle drowns out the message. Even worse, the medium becomes the message. And illness a metaphor for herocentric formula films
Sanjay Nagral
Jul 17, 2020, Mumbai Mirror
I walked into the hospital like any other day. As soon as I entered, I felt there was something different. An excited crowd of staff had gathered near the entrance, all with phones in their hands. Security was looking unusually animated. As I was about to ask the receptionist what was going on, suddenly he strode into the podium accompanied by an entourage of doctors, management and bodyguards. There was chaos as staff, waiting patients and their family members rushed to take pictures. The superstar had come to the hospital to undergo a special test. The hospital had temporarily come to a halt to see him up close. Soon the details of the test were available on WhatsApp groups.
Of course, we are a star-struck country. Health workers are not immune to this. It’s inevitable that Mumbai hospitals will periodically have film stars as patients. Especially the posh hospitals of the western suburbs. Notwithstanding their onscreen magical powers, film stars are also humans who fall ill and need hospitalisation. In that sense, illness is that great equaliser. Except that unlike us, their illness pans out under intense media gaze and ends up as a public spectacle. All kinds of details are broadcast, some even fictitious. There is no serious attempt to protect privacy. For example, you can get details of Amitabh Bachchan’s many hospitalisations since 1982 when he was in Breach Candy Hospital after an injury to now with Covid at Nanavati Hospital.
Don’t celebrities have a right to privacy during an illness? Don’t their family members want to be left alone? If so, why is there a public spectacle every time? Is it ‘leaks’ from insiders or is it that all the players involved also benefit from the news coverage? In the age of image, branding and marketing, is illness also seen as an advertising opportunity?
Leakage of confidential health information involving celebrities is a global problem. In the US, action has been taken against many hospitals for privacy breaches. In England, we have the tragic story of Kate Middleton at the London’s King Edward Hospital when she was admitted for hyperemesis during pregnancy. An Indian nurse Jacintha Saldanha fell for a prank phone call from Australian radio DJs and put them through to Kate’s nurse. There was an uproar and Jacintha later committed suicide.
Celebrities have of course used their reach to increase public awareness of disease and raise funds. Christopher Reeve translated his struggle with spinal cord injury to create awareness on fellow sufferers and fund intense research on the subject. He spent his life on a wheelchair travelling and lobbying for innovation and research into spinal cord injury through his foundation.
An important area where celebrities have helped a public health cause is destigmatisation of disease by coming out in the open as a survivor or sufferer. Several did this for HIV. Amitabh himself came out as a TB survivor and publicly addressed an International TB congress. Deepika Padukone’s depression, Irffan’s rare tumor and Manisha Koirala with ovarian cancer... in their own way, they helped destigmatise their disease.
Are hospitals concerned about privacy for their patients? If so, why is every film star’s illness a public spectacle? Is it about paparazzi? In a competitive environment where legitimate means to project a hospital’s work are limited, a celebrity’s hospitalisation grabs eyeballs. And improves the hospitals image. Even the treating team can get mileage. When occasionally things don’t go as per plan, there is a tendency to blame media.
Like his film career, Amitabh’s encounters with illness has pushed him to play a variety of roles. Destigmatising disease, creating awareness, endorsing government programs and praising hospitals he was being treated in. But he seemed disturbed when he wrote in his blog in 2019, “Do NOT break the CODE of professional documentation... ailments and medical conditions are a confidential individual right... it’s exploitation, and its attempted commerce are a social illegality... all is not in the world of sale”.
Amitabh’s coming out as Covid-affected will give a lot of hope and courage to those fighting it. I can’t call myself an Amitabh fan, though I have watched his first film ‘Saat Hindustani’ and his latest Gulabo Sitabo. However, we all wish that he recovers quickly to continue what has been an amazing filmography.
But mega star messages are double-edged. For example, Amitabh’s tweet endorsing homeopathy for Covid perhaps helped create a market for a treatment that has poor science in support. Also, several stars in India have advertised paan masalas, a health hazard which kills thousands every year. Films are full of surrogate advertising.
Finally, with a celebrity, one wonders whether the attention is on the message or the person. The surrounding spectacle drowns out the message. Even worse, the medium becomes the message. And illness a metaphor for herocentric formula films.