SRK came early, the bathtub didn’t: The story behind Lux’s iconic ad

It takes a certain kind of star power to make an Italian bathtub surrounded by Hema Malini, Juhi Chawla, Kareena Kapoor and Sridevi feel like background noise. Shah Rukh Khan, half-naked and soaking for Lux, pulled it off. No wonder the ad became a pop-culture classic. It turns 20 this year.

This classic was nearly undone when, on the day of the shoot, the bathtub was nowhere to be seen and Shah Rukh Khan turned up early.

“I was almost the first person on the set, and soon I got a tap on my shoulder. I looked back and it was Shah Rukh Khan sitting behind me. It was 9.15 a.m. I expected him to come after 12.30 p.m.,” says Raajesh D Saathi, the ad’s director.

Saathi is the founder of the production house Keroscene Films and is one of the three people who wrote Main Hoon Na, a film starring Khan that was released a year before the Lux ad. No wonder Khan says “Main Hoon Na” in the ad as well.

Such was the ad’s success – a true viral moment before social media was born – that the brand told Saathi they were pulling the media plan because everybody was playing the ad for them.

The ad, conceptualised by JWT (now VML), was made to celebrate Lux’s 75 years in India. A senior source from the brand’s team told afaqs! back in 2005: “Lux is completing 75 years in India. And coinciding with the platinum jubilee of this super brand, we didn’t want to do anything obvious. We wanted to provide a fresh perspective to the brand while maintaining its age-old equity.”

“Khan stayed in that tub for nearly 12 hours, his hands pruned, but he did not complain.”

Raajesh D Saathi

And what a move it was. Known as the beauty soap of the stars, Lux always cast the reigning actress of that generation – Madhubala, Hema Malini, Sridevi, Madhuri Dixit, Juhi Chawla, Kareena Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Alia Bhatt – as its brand ambassador; it was the first time the Unilever soap brand cast a male face. After this ad, Khan appeared once more in a Lux ad with Katrina Kaif in 2012, his last for the soap brand. 

“… Right where he did not look effeminate, he wasn't macho, he just had the right face for the project,” remarks the director about how he thought and shot Khan.

But why was Khan early and the bathtub missing? It turns out the ad’s shoot was set a few days after the Mumbai floods, and the tub was taking its time to reach Famous Studios in Mumbai’s Mahalaxmi from Bhayandar, an outlying suburb.

When Saathi asked Khan about his early arrival, the star quipped, “I just dropped Aryan (his son) off at school, and I drove straight to the set because Hemaji is coming today. I cannot keep her waiting. You know she launched me, don’t you?” Talk about not forgetting who helped you in your early days and maintaining relationships. Malini cast Khan in Dil Aashna Hai, a movie she directed. 

And as the stars began to walk in, so did the bathtub. “Believe me, between the tub hitting the floor and the stars walking on the set, there was a difference of five minutes,” reveals Saathi, adding, “Khan stayed in that tub for nearly 12 hours, his hands were pruney, but he did not complain.”

Twenty years later, Khan’s daughter Suhana is the face of Lux, and one of her first ads for the brand was to promote its body wash over soap. Talk about charting your own path.