Pakistan's famous entertainer Moin Akhtar sits down for a tête-à-tête with Saudi Gazette's Shams Ahsan in Jeddah. HE holds a record of sorts for impersonating more than 340 characters, parodying Kofi Annan, Pervez Musharraf, Saddam Hussein, and Manmohan Singh, to name but a few. A generation has grown up listening to his witty humor. He is a singer, a comedian, a compère, a theater artiste, a master of mimicry, an actor, a TV host, playwright, film producer and director. In short, he is a complete entertainer. Versatility is his hallmark, and healthy humor his forte. Meet Moin Akhtar – the winner of Sitara-e-Imtiaz, the third highest Pakistani honor given to a civilian or military personnel, and Pride of Pakistan, a civilian honor given by the government of Pakistan to distinguished people from the fields of literature, arts, sports, medicine, and science. Moin Akhtar has given entertainment a new dimension. His satires have never degenerated into sarcasm, his punch lines have never hit below the belt. This is the reason he commands the respect generally reserved for an intellectual. But Moin Akhtar is not happy with today's entertainment scene. “There has been a constant deterioration in comedy,” he says. “We have deteriorated to the point that it (comedy) has become obscenity, vulgarity.” “This has to be taken into account seriously, and this is the firm duty of the government. The (Pakistan) Ministry of Information and Culture should intervene and see to it that TV channels broadcast healthy humor and that healthy entertainment is promoted, passed on and performed,” he says. Moin Akhtar does not give any specific reason for this deterioration. “If you don't work hard you deteriorate. If as students you are not committed to your studies, you don't perform well. So as students, we are not working in a way in which we can achieve three As.” He blames everyone – the ministry, owners of TV channels, the artistes, the audience – for this deterioration. “You have to educate society as well.” “I have seen people laughing at the cheapest point, at the cheapest humor, and then later on sitting over a cup of tea, they say the artiste used bad words. No...No... You were the ones sitting in the front row laughing your lungs out. At that time, you had no objection. When everything is gone and you sit with a few educated people, you all of a sudden change your statement,” Moin Akhtar says, bemoaning the attitude of hypocrites. He says: “We have to be very careful. We are answerable to a generation.” But Moin Akhtar has done his bit for posterity. “I don't want to live in videos and books. I want to live in the hearts and minds of people,” he says. “I feel immense pleasure when I see people smiling.” “When my name is announced, and I am received with smiling faces, you cannot imagine the effect it has on my heart and my mind.” Moin Akhtar's popularity spans borders. This is because he takes his work as a challenge. “I take everything as a challenge. The criterion of an entertainer is that he should sing a bit, he should impersonate a bit, he should have the quality of disguising himself. I qualify in more than enough areas of being an entertainer.” Moin Akhtar is a comedian, who impersonates very well. He is an impersonator, who acts skillfully. He is an actor, who brings a different feel to any TV program he hosts. It is not easy for any artiste to play all these parts with perfection, as he himself says: “Every character is a challenge; coming out of your personality and getting into someone else's character is a transformation. You have to divorce your own character, your own mannerism and get into the other character. It is the most painful and difficult thing. I go through that pain every week.” But it is practice which has made him perfect. “I have so much practice. I go to the recording, Anwar (Maqsood of “Loose Talk”) brings the script, I go through it then and there, and then I decide what kind of makeup will be suitable.” “Next week, I will be doing (Barack) Obama, I tell makeup men what kind of wig and makeup I need. They do their work and I will watch Obama's speeches, copying his tone, etc.,” he says about an upcoming episode of the popular TV show “Loose Talk.” However, Moin Akhtar does not do any homework for everyday characters. The one thing that Moin Akhtar avoids is politics. “Politics is a dirty game, I'm not a dirty man. Politicians have not done any good to this country (Pakistan) for the past 62 years.” “I would be the last person to accept any portfolio. I was offered a position. I turned it down. I said you want me to serve the country; I am already serving my country in my humble way.” Does he have any political leanings? “I'm a very careful man. I'm nobody's man. I'm a Pakistani,” he says. He is proud to be a Pakistani, but feels hurt at “what people are contributing to the country.” “I request every Pakistani – government, citizen, politician – to realize that it is high time we should stand together and join hands for the integrity, solidarity and the good of future generations.” “Tomorrow everyone of us will become history, and if history mentions us with a bad name then future generations will spit on us.” He warns of Allah's “azab” (punishment) if people fail in their duty to serve Pakistan properly. “If you cross the level of disobedience, you will be finished.” Moin Akhtar, who started his career with a whimper in 1966 and then shot to the terra firma of the entertainment world with a bang, seems to have mellowed as a person. The effects of aging were visible when we met him. The Moin Akhtar on the stage or on the TV is entirely different from the person, casually relaxing on the couch in a simple shalwar kameez. He admits. “Moin Akhtar as a private person is a very simple man, eats simple food, wears simple clothes, sleeps on the floor. But the other side of Moin Akhtar – the popular person – is different. When he goes out in public, he needs to put on an expensive suit, wear a good watch, wear a good fragrance.” “When the lights are off, you are an ordinary man. You come back to the system where you belong – that's originality. You have to be a very courteous man, very down to earth, kind, loving.” There is one more change noticeable in Moin Akhtar – his inclination toward religion. “I am a Muslim by heart,” he says. He has deep love for Saudi Arabia, so much so that he wants to settle down here. “This place is really incredible. It is a kind of intoxication which you cannot come out of,” he says. “We come here with our soul and our hearts. If at all I am given an opportunity to settle down here which is the most glorious part of the world, the most blessed part of the world, I would go for it and stay here for the rest of my life. Coming here gives encouragement and enhancement to your thought, your belief. You are more strengthened when you come here.” He compares the experience of visiting the Two Holy Mosques with the freshness one feels after taking a shower and putting on new clothes and fragrance. “When you come here, when the blessings are showered on you, you are like a newborn child.” After a career spanning more than 42 years, Moin Akhtar has no mundane aspirations left. He wants to live a life which is in conformity with his religion. “Whenever you get (religious) awakening, that is the dawn of your life,” says Moin Akhtar. __
