Karan Johar revealed that 'Koffee With Karan' began as a distraction after his father’s death in 2004. Initially hesitant due to industry norms, he signed the show to cope with grief. Despite low expectations, it became a 22-year success, though it shaped a public image he feels misrepresents him.
Koffee With Karan has run for 22 years, and the show’s ninth and final season, which began streaming on JioHotstar on October 14, is now underway. In a conversation with THR India, host Karan Johar explained how the talk show came about: not as a career move, but as a way to keep himself occupied after the death of his father, producer Yash Johar, in June 2004.
Johar said the idea of hosting a chat show had been on his mind for a while, inspired by veteran interviewers Tabassum and Simi Garewal, though people around him felt a filmmaker had no business in front of the camera. A deal with Star Network for two seasons and 50 episodes was on the table, but the money looked small, and he let the idea go while his father was alive.
But on the thirteenth day after Yash Johar’s death, a senior industry figure, whom Johar chose not to name, visited the family and told him to take the show on. “He said, 'Distract yourself. Do something',” Johar recalled. “I wanted to do something, work towards something. Because there was no movie I had written. There was nothing to get into.”
The first episode aired in November 2004, and Johar signed away the intellectual property without a second thought, never expecting the show to go so far.
Johar also addressed the image the show has given him over the years. “There are a lot of perceptions about me that have actually come out of that show... that is not very good,” he said. He links this to the part he plays as host, not to who he is. “When I’m sitting in that chair, I’m also playing a part,” he said. “The perception of me has been the downside of the show.”
Johar added that people tend to revise their opinion once they meet him, and that celebrities in general get read through the show, sometimes favourably, but, in his case... rarely so.
Johar, 54, said he is now stepping back from work outside filmmaking, with a target of at least three directed features to his name by the time he turns 60. The final season of Koffee With Karan continues to stream on JioHotstar.
Watch the full interview with Karan Johar dropping on our YouTube channel later today