“Aamir Khan is very hard-working, but he must understand that growing your hair and moustache for a film doesn't make you a great actor,” said Naseeruddin Shah in a television interview. In the same interview, Naseer said that the early phase of Shahrukh Khan resembled that of Rajesh Khanna, although he finds King Khan to be far more hard-working then the superstar Khanna. And how does he rate the badshah as an actor? “I don’t think Shahrukh is a great actor either.”

Nobody doubts Naseeruddin Shah’s prowess as an all time genius. The actor with a mind-boggling repertoire of stellar performances like ‘Paar’, ‘Sparsh’, ‘Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron’, ‘Nishant’, ‘Albert Pinto Ko Gussa Kyun Aata Hai’, ‘Masoom’, ‘The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen’, ‘Maqbool’ and the more recent ‘Being Cyrus’, nervously awaits the release of his debut directorial venture ‘Yun Hota To Kya Hota’. A master theatre actor and director, Naseer has been associated with spellbinding story telling of Saadat Hasan Manto, Ismat Chughtai, Waiting For Godot and Shakespeare. He is finding the transition from directing on stage to films a bit difficult. The economics of filmmaking involves compromises as big money is at stake. So how much does he give himself as a director? “Five out of ten,” he admits.

Naseer saab, it is easy to pass judgments on big stars’ acting abilities. But, maybe filmmaking is also about style and risk taking. Great acting can also be a relative term. After all, the public opinion is frivolous and changes every Friday.