Dev Anand was a beloved actor who was considered one of the most significant and successful in the industry. He was a trendsetter and a risk-taker known for his charm and mannerisms. Actors often face weird situations because of their profession, and something similar happened with Dev as well. A foreigner mistook him for a taxi driver, and that person even asked the actor to take them to the red light area. Keep scrolling for more.
If you want ‘classic’ Bombay and Dev Anand in the same movie, Chetan Anand’s Taxi Driver (1954) is the film to watch. Wide, empty streets where cabbies have a free run, little boats bobbing in the sea, rows of sea-facing palm trees, a city where the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel is the place to be and be seen at, and an utterly charming hero whose haunt is a seedy nightclub — Taxi Driver sealed the image of the young Dev Anand, then just a decade-old in the industry, as a romantic hero, and Bombay as the City of Dreams.
Chetan seemed depressed. Both his directorial ventures had failed to leave any mark on the box office. As I was sitting in the recording booth of a film studio during a break in filming for one of my outside projects, a friend of mine from my struggling days suggested, ‘Why don’t you make a film on a taxi driver? His is always a very down-to-earth, rough and tough character. Should suit your image, especially after Baazi.’ It seemed to me a good box-office thought. I told my brother, who at first smiled it away casually, but immediately afterwards, seeing that there was a chance to make another film, jumped at the idea.
