Shah Rukh Khan's Secret Revealed

Do you know the secret behind Shah Rukh’s perfect ‘six- pack abs’...???

Well... it is sheer hard work!

While he was shooting for the song Dard-E- Disco, he had a makeshift gym arranged on the set and would work out in between shots!

Now that is what we call - Dedication!

Notice to Shah Rukh Khan

The Bombay High court has issued notices to Bollywood actor Shahrukh Khan and the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai, seeking a reply regarding the construction adjacent to Shahrukh's bungalow.

The two parties have been asked to explain irregularities in the construction carried out by the actor adjacent to his bungalow named 'Mannat' in suburban Bandra.

The High Court has asked both the actor and the Municipal Corporation, to file their replies within two weeks, on a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by a Mumbai based NGO. The NGO has alleged that while carrying out the construction, the width of the road had been reduced.

Source: TimesNow.TV

Farah Khan on Om Shanti Om and bare chested SRK

How do you react to the immense hype around your second directorial venture Om Shanti Om?

I'm excited about it. Surprisingly, I'm not scared at all. Maybe once the release date comes closer I'll get the nervous pangs. But still I don't think there is anything to be scared about since I've seen the film. Shah Rukh and I didn't expect Om Shanti Om (OSO) to get so hyped. We didn't expect that Main Hoon Na is remembered so well.


Main Hoon Na was an unapologetic masala Hindi phillum, what is the vibe of OSO?

This one is also a Hindi phillum. But unlike Main Hoon Na that had multiple tracks, OSO has a single track which is extremely dramatic. The best bit about OSO is that first half of the film is set in the 1970's Bollywood. This has made the texture of the film very refreshing. My team had a great time looking for references. If we had to shoot a hospital scene then we made sure we created a hospital out of a 70's film. The junior artistes in the film are also from the 70's. I think OSO will bring back the fashion trends of the 70's: the bell bottoms, the side locks and the curls. That's also the reason why my new girl, Deepika Padukone with a bouffant looks different than all the other girls in a mini skirt and a bra top. We're very confident about the retro look of our film that's why we have also sold the OSO fashion line to Shopper's Stop and Siya.


And what's with the huge poster of a film called 'Dreamy Girl' throughout the first half of OSO?

Oh that? I wanted to project Deepika as a huge 70's superstar aka Hema Malini so we decided to take off on the film Dream Girl. The making of Dreamy Girl is the funniest bit in the film since we've shown Deepika romancing the likes of Rajesh Khanna and Sunil Dutt. We've done some major computer generated imagery to make sure that happens. We've also made SRK wear white shoes and pants like Jeetendra and made him do all sorts of things like crawl on the floor for a song.

And you also made sure SRK gets a six pack for a shirtless song sequence?

See, SRK will do anything that is required for the film. He really worked out for OSO because he has two distinct looks in the film depicting 1977 and 2007. Since he plays a superstar of 2007 he had to look like a star of today. I told him during Main Hoon Na itself that I want to shoot a bare chest scene of his since he was playing an army officer. But we couldn't do that since he had just had a back operation. But he promised me that if he ever does a bare torso scene he'll do it for my film. For OSO he asked me to give him three months since his reasoning was that if he doesn't have a six pack he won't bare his chest. By the time we shot the scene he had eight packs. He worked so hard on his body that his constant joke on the sets was that 'Please let me go back to acting'.


Yeah well they say in the industry that SRK can never say no to you?

Well, I can't get him to do everything. I mean, he's not going to do anything stupid just because I'm telling him to do it. It's just that we share the same kind of irreverent humour and love for the same kind of movies so somewhere he trusts my judgment. I don't think anyone else could have made him stand quietly while Satish Shah spits on his face. He didn't do it blindly for me but he did it because he knew it'll work. There is no god baazi with SRK. We don't act like two eccentric geniuses making a film, we want to enjoy the process of making a film and so we have fun. In OSO we have both gone quite mental.


Why did you opt for Deepika Padukone as the leading lady?

I needed a new girl so that I could present a new pairing with SRK. Moreover since my heroine is a superstar of the 70's I couldn't have cast Aishwarya Rai or Rani Mukerji who are big stars of today and tell people to imagine them as the stars of 70's. I needed a new face for my character, Shanti Priya. Also Deepika is a classic beauty who has the poise of a South actress. She's also a fabulous dancer and after doing her screen test I was convinced she'll work for the film. I really felt as if I was launching my own daughter.


How did you manage to rope in literally the entire industry for a song?

Yeah well that one has turned out as the mother of all item songs. I don't know what others will do after this song. We approached 34 actors and 30 turned up. It took us six days to shoot the song. All the heroines came for SRK and all the heroes for me.


I believe Mithun Chakraborty caused a stampede?

You heard right. He caused a traffic jam. There was a queue of people just to see him. Ecstatic fans even asked SRK to click their pictures with Mithun da. He happily obliged.


SRK is also the producer of the film, what is his verdict about OSO?

He's already shown most of the film to everyone on his dirty laptop with its dirty sound. He's quite happy with it. We've gone through the phase of writing down the mistakes on paper. It's the biggest film out of Red Chillies and we realize the expectations.


You have a mini film empire in your home turf itself with husband Shirish Kunder and brother Sajid Khan also making films. How do you cope with it?

It's great. I'm more creatively involved with Shirish's films since we live together. Sajid does his own thing. We've always been a film crazy family so it's all good.


You're expecting triplets, how is that going?

Oh my babies are quite happy on the film set. They never trouble me when I'm shooting. Only when I'm in the house do they make me puke and feel all drained. I'm sure all three of them will also get into film-making since they are already film babies.


There are rumours that you're quitting choreography?

That's true. I can't do another wedding song. Only if an international song comes my way, I might think about it. I won't choreograph even for Shirish now. He's quite pleased with this decision since we fought a lot during Jaan-E-Mann.


Any recent film that you wish you had directed?

Rang De Basanti. I was totally blown over by it. Not only did it have a superb story, it was also technically awesome. I like well made and well shot films. Most of our films look like Gujarati TV serials.


What's next?

Next year I'll take a break since my babies will need me. I'll start my next film in 2009. Shirish will start his film, Joker with Akshay Kumar in 2008.

Harneet Singh, Screen India

Om Shanti Om's Music on iTunes

It is for the first time that a Bollywood film’s music album will be available for full downloads on mobile handsets and digital media including itunes across 23 countries including India, Singapore, UK, US, UAE, Sri Lanka and Malaysia.

Music company T-Series, which holds the music rights of the film directed by Farah Khan, will facilitate the service through its mobile content partner Hungama Mobile.
T-Series will simultaneously launch the music on CDs on the 18th of September.

The announcement will be made in Dubai over the weekend, followed by an announcement in India early next week. T-Series confirmed the development.

“It is true that the music of Om Shanti Om will be released across platforms,” Bhushan Kumar, chairman & managing director of T-Series told Business Standard.

Apart from tie-ups with all the leading telecom service providers in India, Hungama has partnered with several service providers across countries where the music will be made available.

Some of the carriers are UAE-based telecom service providers Du and ETISALAT, UK-based Vodafone, European mobile phone network provider O2, Singapore’s Singtel and US-based Verizon.

Hungama already has tie-ups with around 150 telecom service provider worldwide.

Neeraj Roy, CEO of Hungama Mobile said, “Our aim is to release the music across digital formats globally. Since Om Shanti Om is a much-awaited film starring Shah Rukh Khan, the music will have a massive appeal even overseas.” He added that the price points for music download on handsets will be in line with the respective markets.

For instance, download per song will cost 2-3 dhirams in UAE, while it will cost 1.99 pounds on the O2 network. The downloading price in India is around Rs 25 a song, with additional download costs on mobile handsets.

The additional cost is usually 10 paise per 10 kilobytes and the average size of each song is 500 kilobytes. However, itunes will cost 99 cents.

The pricing for internet downloads varies, as the user can either download the entire album or a few songs.

T-Series and Hungama were the first to introduce fully downloadable songs in India for the mobile handset. This was done for Hrithik Roshan starrer, Krrish. However, Hutch was the only service provider back then.

The mobile music market in India consists of ringback tones, polyphonic tones, truetones, fulltrack downloads and caller ID tunes. It is estimated to be 60 per cent of all digital sales in the world for the next two years, according to PricewaterhouseCooper report.

Aminah Sheikh & Shivani Shinde, Business Standard India

The SRK Effect

“Yeh chakki-belan chalane wali Bharatiya nari hai. Yeh kabhi knicker wicker pahan ke hockey ke maidan par utar sakti hai kya?”

The ‘sports administrator’, who spoke these infamous words on screen, had to eat his words in the end when the ‘Chak De’ girls came home triumphant with the hockey world cup. The movie, it seems, didn’t just end up with the usual feel good factor and a tax-free tag.

The SRK reel effect in ‘Chak De’ seems to have rubbed off on the real as more and more girls seem to be taking up active sports.

Shah Rukh Khan’s ‘Chak De India’ has got the goody girls hooked on to sports. “It’s a revolution,” says Anjali Shah of Premier Indian Football Academy (PIFA), adding, “The number of inquiries and enrolment of girls in the game has gone up by 50 per cent this year.

In fact for the very first time, women above 20 years also want to learn the game and play for the country.” PIFA is all set to form a woman’s football team after four women insisted on learning the game and forming a woman’s team.

PIFAis on the lookout for 15 women to complete their women’s football team. And as far as hockey is concerned, the sport has suddenly received a huge momentum.

Ignatius D’Souza, sub coach of the Bombay Hockey Women’s Association informs that four Mumbai schools namely St Paul Convent High School at Dadar, Pawar Public School in Bhandup, Canossa Convent in Andheri and St Teresa’s Convent in Santacruz have introduced hockey in their sports curriculum.

Even colleges are fast catching up with the game. Nisha Nair, the girl who plays Soi Moi in ‘Chak De India’ is an ace hockey player in real life as well.

She along with Ranjan Negi, the one who taught Chak De girls to play hockey, encouraged the Poddar College girls to form their own team. Nisha says, “I felt great when Poddar College actually formed a girls’ hockey team. Things are changing. Everybody around me seem to have suddenly grown fond of sports. It feels great.”

Way to go Shah Rukh !

Riddhi Doshi, DNA