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The year is 2000. A tall, dark, and not-very-handsome kid steps into the greasepaint coated streets of Bollywood in J.P. Dutta’s Refugee alongside an equally awkward Kareena Kapoor. The two don’t mix at all and the movie is a classic dud. This wasn’t the sort of Friday box office opening that Abhishek, the son of the actor of the millennium, Amitabh Bachchan, was praying for. While almost every star kid was pulling off a hit in their debut film, Abhishek was living in a parallel universe. In a span of four years, he reeled off one flop after another, totalling a potentially career-busting 17.
 The critics pulled out their long knives. The press panned his acting abilities and his dance-challenged physique. Statements flew that but for his surname and his papa’s backing, Abhishek would have been playing a bank clerk rather than busting the bottomlines of Bollywood producers.
For Abhishek it was surely a hard time. He was going through all this while other star sons like Hrithik Roshan, Fardeen Khan, Zayed Khan, Shahid Kapoor and Tushaar Kapoor were giving Bollywood’s A-Team a run for its money. Worse, Amitabh himself in his twilight years was going through a purple patch, re-writing the script, bagging some incredible roles and carrying movies to box-office glory. All this, on his own steam.
There was more angst in store. Karisma Kapoor, his girlfriend, broke off their engagement Bollywood-style after the wedding invitations had virtually been despatched. Call it rock bottom.
But then like the proverbial Phoenix, Abhishek rose from the celluloid ashes. With his performance in Mani Ratnam’s Yuva, he proved his mettle as an actor. His performance earned him the Filmfare Best Supporting Actor Award. Box office success came with Dhoom in 2004 and suddenly he was a bankable star. While the crowds clearly came to watch John Abraham, Dhoom turned out to be Abhishek’s Zanjeer, that one movie that paid off the sins of the past.
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