Sunday Times - Sunday, 29 August, 2004

Khan hasn't charged a single rupee for doing the role, leaving it to the producers to determine his worth. He has also said that whatever they pay him will go to an orphanage in the suburb of Band-ra in Mumbai.

Khan, dubbed Bollywood's bad boy, says if the role makes even one person realise the threat of Aids, it will the most important role he has done.

The United Nations' Aids programme has lauded the movie for making people sit up and take notice. Interestingly, the actress who directs Phir Milenge, Revathy, starred opposite Khan in one of his early releases, Love.

* Phir Milenge is one of two new releases for Abhi-shek Bachchan, who also stars in Bollywood's first biker film, Dhoom. A few years back, when Bachchan bumped into John Abraham admiring a superbike on the set of Zameen, he remarked: "Only a madman would ride that." Now he and his motorbike are inseparable, which settles the argument about whether there's a bit of lunacy running through his veins.

* The director of Main Hoon Na, Farah Khan, has announced her engagement to the editor of the film, Shirish Kunder. It happened while the pair were on holiday in Goa. A wedding date has been set for next month. Khan, who is also regarded as Bollywood's top choreographer, will have now literally have a man dancing to her tune.

* Akshay Kumar has been celebrating an extraordinary award. He has been named this year's winner of the Rajiv Gandhi Award for excellence in entertainment, and his phone has not stopped ringing since the announcement was made.

* Music director Anu Malik will make an appearance as a disc jockey in Waqt - The Race Against Time and also plays a pandit in Bride and Prejudice. Malik has already been seen in films like Baazigar and Har Dil Jo Pyar Karega. Waqt stars Amitabh Bach- chan, Akshay Kumar and Priyanka Chopra, while Bride and Prejudice is Aishwarya Rai's big crossover film directed by Gurinder Chadha of Bend It Like Beckham fame.

* While on the subject of Little Miss Gorgeous, the word in European modelling circles is that she is about to replace Mick Jagger's daughter Elizabeth as the face of a top international cosmetics brand. This is another step towards achieving global recognition, as Aish already endorses the brand in Asian markets.

* Ever wondered how the Big B manages to look so good at the ripe old age of 62? Well, here's his secret. The superstar is up before the crack of dawn and spends at least two hours at one of Mumbai's top gyms, where he practises yoga for at least half the time. The rest is spent on rigorous exercises.

* Undeterred by the failure of his first two Hindi films, Dil Se and Yuva, Mani Ratnam still has his heart set on conquering Bollywood, and it now appears he has found the right person to do it with. Ratnam is about to team up with the perfectionist Aamir Khan for a film that is guaranteed to have ton-gues wagging. Considering what headstrong characters both of them are, this could be either a match made in heaven or an engagement from hell.

* The love affair between Aftab Shivdasani and Shamita Shetty appears to be a thing of the past. The star of Masti and the actress who's best known for her special song appearances have been an item for some time without ever creating a public fuss about it.

* Popular playback singer P G Krishnaveni - better known as Jikki - has died of cancer. Jikki's career spanned 50 years and she sang more than 10 000 songs in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Sinhala and Hindi.

One of her popular recent songs was Vanna Vanna from Senthamizh Paattu, in which she sang the compositions of Illaiyaraja and M S Visvanathan.

Jikki started her career as a child actress but took to singing at the age of 16. She was married to another popular playback singer, A M Raja, who died four years ago.

* Tamil cinema also lost actor Udhayaprakash last week. Born Manikandan, he made his debut under the name of Udhayaprakash in Nyaaya Tharaasu (1989) and was best known for his role as Kushbu's brother in P Vasu's hit film Chinna Thambi. He acted in 85 films in Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam.

He was married to Kogila and had a daughter, but he became addicted to alcohol and his family life crumbled. Then he became involved in an extramarital affair that put an end to his failing marriage.

When news of Udhayaprakash's circumstances appeared in the Chennai press, popular actor and member of parliament Sarathkumar secured roles for him in Arasu and Dhivaan. By that time, he had chronic asthma and a serious heart condition. He was returning from hospital to the offices of the South Indian Cine Artists' Association when he collapsed while alighting from an autoricksha. He was rushed to hospital but was pronounced dead on arrival.

* Vijay's Madhura was released worldwide at the weekend. His last release, Gilli, is still on circuit.

Madhura pairs Vijay for the first time with Sonia Agarwall ( Kaadhal Konndain and Kovil ). Directed by Madhesh, it claims some firsts for Indian cinema. It features a song filmed in various locations in France and uses a record number of shots in the final cut - 274 in all. The song sequence also features 80 computer graphic shots, another first for Indian cinema.

If Gilli proved Vijay's marketability, Madhura will show his versatility as an actor, he promised in a recent TV interview.

With Soorya, Vikram and now Madhavan having shown an eagerness to experiment with roles, the press has been quick to point out that, apart from Kannukkull Nilavu, Vijay has shown little interest in widening his repertoire.

It will take more than a single film to restore Vijay to the number one spot he once occupied.

* It is proving to be a turbulent year for most producers and actors, with many big productions unable to release on schedule.

After the surprising announcement that Goutham's Chennaiyil oru Maz-haikaalam may be ready for release only for Pongal next year, other films have announced costly delays.

The latest is Ajith-kumar's Ji, directed by Lingusaamy ( Run ). In a surprise move, the planned location shoot overseas was cancelled and the producer, S S Chakravarthy, instructed Lingusaamy to film the songs in Chennai.

The delay might prove costly as Trisha will not be available when the crew of Ji are ready for her.

Lingusaamy has asked Ajithkumar to intervene, as he has a long relationship with Chakravarthy.

Another problem for Ajith is that Ji has been slated for a November 12 release, which will conflict with the release of his other film, Attagaasam. This could doom one or both films at the box office. With Janaa having flopped, Ajith can ill afford another failure.

* Ria sen ( Taj Mahaal and Good Luck ) appears opposite Arjun in what has been tipped to be the song sequence of the year in the much-delayed Arasaatchi. The film also stars Lara Dutta and an impressive supporting cast, including Raghuvaran, Mannivanna, Naaser, P Vasu, Anandraj, Ponnambalam, Mansoor Ali Khan, Vivek, Vayaapuri, Curran, Vindhiya, Devan, Rajan P Dev, Ajay Rathnam, S V Sekar, Delhi Ganesh and M N Nambiar.

Arasaatchi features music by Harris Jayaraj and was written and directed by N Maharajan ( Vallarasu and Anjaneyya ).

The film will be Arjun's most expensive since Shankar's Mudhalvan. Maharajan is negotiating the Hindi rights even before the release of the Tamil version.

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