| Kavita Chhibber
has been a journalist and astrologer for many years. To know more about Kavita and her work, please visit
www.KavitaChhibber.com.
|
 |
|
|
<<Home
|
|
Bollywood Ballyhoo-Crossing Over
|
|
Star frenzy at Bollywood shows, the growing number of crossover films, and the debut of Aishwarya Rai on American TV...Bollywood sells like nothing else, says KAVITA
CHHIBBER.
|
|
|
I remember that as a child, one of the most exciting things for me was when my grandmother took me to watch the Ram Lila, a stage show put up by local amateurs depicting scenes from the life of Lord
Rama. I remember sitting on the floor in a large stadium totally entranced by the colorful costumes, the melodramatic dialogues, and the varied emotions on and off stage as people responded to the joyous birth of Lord
Rama, his exile and his life’s journey filled with all kinds of obstacles till he returned home to a joyous, sparkling welcome. The performance usually ended with a burst of firecrackers and the euphoria would last for days. I would gather all the kids in the neighborhood and we would enact our own version with our doting parents and grand parents seated in the audience. At times we would bully and bribe other neighborhood kids to sit and cheer for us.
Stage shows have come a long way since then. Its rare to see something like the Masters of
Kathakali, a mind blowing introduction to Indian mythology through the beautiful classical art form
Kathakali, from coastal Kerala that I saw last month. Instead what sells is Shahrukh Khan lip syncing and gyrating to filmi music, as a wide eyed audience in all shapes and sizes screams its lungs out. I remember driving to a concert in Chicago with actor Sunjay Dutt and he made the mistake of lowering the glass of the tinted window on my brother’s car. The mass of humanity just went ballistic. What was funnier was that people rushed to me asking me for my autograph just because I happened to be with him. I asked one of the guys if I resembled any of the actresses participating in the show. He said I didn’t, but it didn’t matter. I became a star by proximity to the star. Indeed big time film stars, pulsating special effects on stage, technical wizardry and an invitation to come onstage and dance with the stars if you agree to buy front row seats (that range from 500 to 5000 dollars per ticket) has become the formula today for hit shows.
|
 |
It all began in the 1970s when a handful of Indians living in New York started hankering for the culture of India. Two of the earliest pioneers in the field were Yashpal
Soi, an industrial engineering and management major from Columbia University and Amit Govil a CPA in New York. Soi began with a radio program in 1969 featuring community news and music from India and later interviewed dignitaries like Morarji Desai and Mother Teresa. Govil began with beauty pageants and then went on to shows before withdrawing from the rat race in 1994 when it became financially riskier. Soi’s radio program became so popular that New York Times called Soi the cultural ambassador of India. |
|
|
Soi later hosted Asha Parekh, Kathak maestro Gopi Krishna and legendary singers like Asha
Bhonsle, Manna Dey, Mohammed Rafi before switching to star shows in 1987.Soi said he paid $ 179,000 as rent for the night for his first star show. Today shows starring Shahrukh Khan and Hritik Roshan cost many times over just to produce, package and present.
Atlanta too has seen its share of promoters. Mustafa Ajmeri has assisted in the marketing and presentation of shows ranging from plays to evenings filled with music to Bollywood shows. Kamru Hamrani has stepped in and presented some of the best plays in town. Monty Hudda has done a few shows but each one has been of mega proportions with superstars like Amitabh Bachchan to Hritik Roshan and Aamir Khan. Perhaps the man who has marketed everything with class and consistently brought good shows, be they music legends, or Bollywood shows or plays to Atlanta, has been Mark
Premji. Almost every promoter I have spoken to has said that it’s really the stars that go laughing to the bank. The promoters seldom make huge profits. Mark said jokingly “ Yeh Pesha nahin nasha hai” and added that any one who wants to get in to this needs a job on the side to pay the bills.
|
 |
Crossover films like Bend it Like Beckham and Monsoon Wedding, Bollywood Hollywood and now Bride and Prejudice have caught the imagination
of people. Inter-ethnic dating between South Asians and Americans has made the latter more willing to explore anything South Asian be it cuisine or the arts or clothing. Henna tattoos and
bindis are a major attraction these days. Many Hollywood stars are using Indian designer wear. |
|
|
From Bombay Dreams on Broadway which had the likes of Bill and Hillary Clinton dancing in the aisles to Hindi music, to Aishwarya Rai making her air headed giggly debut on Sixty Minutes and the David Letterman Show, Bollywood has come a long way. I’m not sure Ms Rai did much to further its cause or her own, but the fact is that we haven’t seen Ravi Shankar or Zakir Hussain whose music has global appeal, being invited to such shows in recent years. Does it make the seemingly un cerebral Ms Rai better than them? Not really, it only shows how well Bollywood has packaged itself today.
|
|
Tell us what you think of this feature. Email us
at contact@nripulse.com.
|
|
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in these columns are solely those of the writers and do not necessarily represent those of the editor/publisher.
|
|
