September 24, 1994, Saturday, FINAL EDITION

SECTION: ARTS; Pg. J14

LENGTH: 769 words

BYLINE: BY SID ADILMAN TORONTO STAR

 BODY:
    Meet the most popular star who attended the recent Toronto film festival.

   Unless you are East Indian or a native of that region, you've never seen
Kamal Hassan (Kamalahasan) on screen or even heard of him, but you should.

   Now 40, having acted for half his life, Hassan has about 7,000 fan clubs
across  India  with a total "hard-core" membership of about 300,000 people.


   Redford, Streisand, Newman, Schwarzenegger and Hoffman don't come close to
that. And neither they nor other Hollywood stars who attach themselves to 
socialcauses invoke their fans to follow them - certainly not as Hassan does.

   Hassan insists that his fans do not tattoo his name on their bodies (as fans
of many other East Indian stars commonly do), don't give him presents or shower
him with flowers. And he has firmly ordered them not to expect him to quit the
movies for politics. It is usual for major stars of Indian movies after lengthy
careers to abandon the screen for politics and to convert their fan clubs into
effective campaigners.

   Hassan, a dashing star of mainstream movies from South  India,  regularly
plays the outsider defending the less fortunate or noble ideals. In real-life,
he has a social conscience. Instead of luxuriating in the worship of his fans
and selling them T-shirts bearing his name, he asks them to volunteer their 
time to help the poor of tribal villages, work to help conquer illiteracy, go 
against Hindu tradition and will their eyes at death, donate books to 
orphanages and schools and regularly donate blood to the Red Cross rather than 
to commercial blood suppliers. And his fans do, in the thousands. For example,
10,000 people willed their eyes on "one single day."


  Perhaps, sly and calculating moves to a future in politics? "I don't have any
political ambitions," Hassan insisted in a festival interview.

   "I have asked these clubs not to waste man hours. All these fan clubs of 
minehave been converted into social service organizations. There is this power.
I can use it, or let down the social reins. They get no remuneration out of 
this. Many of my fans are day laborers and they have to keep this time aside 
from the time they keep for earning money.

   "I felt these people would be wasting their lives just chanting my name. If
they just did that, and I don't turn political, their whole focus would be
wasted. So, I gave them something to munch."

   Devoutly committed to social causes, Hassan refuses to sell photos of 
himself to his fans and does not license merchandise bearing his name, "not 
even a T-shirt," he declares. "They buy those from other vendors" whom he cannot
legally control. "And I do not endorse any products. I don't do commercials.
I've never done one in my life."

   Because he asked them, his fan clubs use their annual dues to publish books
and an in-house magazine of short stories by young Indian writers whose careers
he encourages. General movie-fan magazines follow Hassan's personal life.
 
  He has starred in 175 movies - about triple the number any Hollywood megastar
makes in a lifetime of leading roles. Because of language differences, many
Indian movies (600 are produced annually) are shown only regionally. His are
seen nationally.

   His adult acting career began in 1975. "For the first six years, I didn't
know what to do with this crowd which was collecting around me. I was moved to
tears. Sometimes 20 or 30 boys would run 150 miles just to give me a torch. At
6.30 a.m. they'd be outside my house. I would come out and they would fall at 
myfeet. It's a sad sight. One can boast about it in a press interview, but not 
to my countrymen or to any person for that matter.

   "That's when I contacted people and said, 'What do I do with these guys? I
can't ask them to go away. How can I be a benevolent dictator?' The idea came 
to do something worthwhile."

   Now, Hassan says, several other Indian actors have followed his example and
political parties have come calling on him more urgently.

   The son of a top South Indian criminal lawyer, he began acting as a child 
"as a lark," then against family tradition studied theatre acting and dance and
worked his way to choreographer, screenwriter, assistant director and handsome,
brooding star.

   And he's sometimes different on screen, too, where - snubbing advice of
producers - he has played against type, "a village idiot in one and a dwarf in
another one," also to box-office success.

   Despite his enormous success in  India,  he yearns to appear in English
language movies that would play around the world. Neither Hollywood nor noted 
Indian producer/directors Merchant/Ivory have called.

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