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Veteran actor Satish Shah, who passed away at the age of 74 in Mumbai, leaves behind a legacy of timeless laughter. From his unforgettable characters in films to his witty turn as Indravadan Sarabhai in Sarabhai vs Sarabhai, Shah defined sharp, situational humour for a generation. While the sitcom today enjoys cult status, the actor had once revealed that the show was actually one of his “first failures on television.” In an earlier conversation with DNA, Satish Shah admitted that the show struggled to find an audience when it first aired. “Let me tell you something, we did the serial as a weekly. However, at that time it was not publicised much. By the time people got to know that it’s a good serial and started watching it, it was taken off air due to lack of TRPs! It was the first failure of my career on TV. I felt bad. Later, the show was re-run as a daily. That’s when people got hooked on it,” he had said. He even revealed that he took a pay cut for the show, something he rarely did. “The irony is Sarabhai was a big flop when it was released the first time, otherwise it would have been still running. And that was one show for which I had compromised on my remuneration, too.” Despite the show’s rocky start, Shah’s chemistry with Ratna Pathak Shah, who played Maya Sarabhai, remains one of Indian television’s most iconic pairings. Their on-screen banter felt so natural that many believed they shared a real-life bond — and in some ways, they did. “Ratnaji’s mother and my father’s younger sister were best friends. Her mother got married in my aunt’s house. At that time we were not into acting, but we knew each other… Her husband (Naseeruddin Shah) is my best friend and my wife is her best friend. Hum dono screen par aate the toh really husband-wife ki tarah the. That is chemistry,” he said. Director Deven Bhojani once revealed that Satish initially agreed to do the show with a condition — he’d only work till 6 pm. “He is very mischievous in real life too… Initially for 2-3 days he worked till six, but after that, he started having so much fun that even if we did his pack up, he would stay till 9 pm on the set.” Though Sarabhai vs Sarabhai didn’t shine in its first run, it eventually became Shah’s most celebrated performance.
