BOLLYWOOD BACKSTAGE: HOW STARS ARE MADE

Come nascono le nuove star di Bollywood? Lachmi Deb Roy prova a spiegarlo nell'articolo Bollywood backstage: how stars are made, pubblicato il 12 dicembre 2021 da Outlook. Di seguito un corposo estratto:

'Getting a break in Bollywood is one thing, it is another to become a star. There's a publicity machinery at work in the film industry that churns up media frenzy, of course at a price. (...)

Publicists go to the extent of telling the stars whom they should meet, date and party with. (...) The trend of hiring a specialised publicist who can handle the press, the controversies and gossip were always in demand. And it’s an open secret that Bollywood thrives on publicity and anybody who can help the star in doing it even if he/she demands an obnoxious sum of money is a winner. (...) Every star these days except for a very few have a huge team of publicists and talent management agencies working behind them. It is they who handle their public life and do exactly what it requires to make a star. They are considered to be the brain behind the stars. It’s like how much you can pay to hire a publicist and your career is done in Bollywood. (...)

The relationship between a star and a journalist primarily depended on either party, but with the publicists coming in the scene, it has changed to quite an extent. How professional do you choose to keep it or how personal you decide to make it. How you are able to separate the personal from the professional that depends entirely on the two parties concerned. PR or entertainment agents have been around always but now it has become more structured with corporates and studios and streaming platforms coming into the scene. What is happening is that journalists are seen by these emerging corporate entities as instruments in building word of mouth for a film/series. (...) Even gossip is losing value. Along with PRs, the social media platforms have ensured that stars are directly out there for the viewers and fans. They trust this one to one than an interview with a journalist. (National award-winning film critic and journalist, Namrata Joshi) Joshi adds, “The stars rarely give interviews other than the mediated ones before the release. And journalists don’t try hard enough. I find totally bland coverage dominating the scene right now, more so in the wake of Covid-19 pandemic when stories apparently “dried up” because films were not getting released and PRs were not giving out interviews or organising events and conferences.”

These agencies play an important role in managing actor’s schedules, which parties they should be attending, who they should make friends with along with their finances and brand association. (...) There are many film journalists who survived in the last two years were the ones who were able to write about and pursue from behind the scene rather than becoming spokespersons for the industry. Joshi points out, “(...) I think a majority of journalists also don’t stretch their boundaries and just keep doing stuff offered to them. There is so much more to do even if stars are not “available”. Trying to stick your neck out for the interesting films round the corner, discovering new voices in filmmaking - very little happening on that count.” PRs have changed the scenario but that doesn’t absolve journalists of their own responsibility in bringing things to such a pass. Also, this is a leaf out of the West where “press junkets” are a thing. But this PR driven coverage is not the only things one sees in cinema coverage in the West in the manner you see it dominating here.

Group CEO and Co-founder, Vijay Subramaniam, of Collective Artists Network, India’s largest pop culture marketplace says, “The beauty about the agency business is not about who makes the stars. It is about having absolute passion in the talent that you work with. I think the biggest and the first and foremost ingredient of the client is to build relationship of the client living the dream of the star on camera, you as an agent one has to stand right behind him/her. It is about the agent dreaming the dream bigger and harder than them.” (...) Subramaniam explains that as an agency making stars one need to have that makes the best infrastructure available to make the talents shine. Publicist should know what is their go to market strategy depending on their vocation and how one should deal with each talent differently. He says, “The marketing strategy changes from an artiste, to an actor, to a comedian and to a musician.” (...)

Dale Bhagwagar who has been the longest surviving Bollywood publicist and has spent around 33 years in the industry since 1997 recollects that when he stepped into this profession, most of the publicists during those days were not very learned. He reminisces, “I got a lot of new trends in the industry and I kind of tried to stay ahead of my time so that was a big plus point for me.” (...) There was a time around 2008 when Bhagwagar’s branding got well established in the media because he was also doubling up as a spokesperson to all his clients in Bollywood. He says, “I was the first to start legal agreements in Bollywood PR.” (...) When Shilpa Shetty went in for Big Brother, she was inside the house and Bhagwagar was the only connect outside. He spoke on behalf of Shetty and held seven press conferences while she was in the Big Brother house. Over a period of time Bhagwagar became so powerful that he got accepted as a spokesperson along with being a publicist to his clients. 

Bhagwagar very clearly states that he is the only publicist who charges advanced payment from the clients so that he doesn’t lose out on money. He says, “I always double up as a spokesperson to my client whenever they fall into any controversy. Bollywood celebrities know that I will be able to deal with the media in a politically correct manner whereas they can focus on their acting and the star aura should remain intact. I give them the assurance that they shouldn’t bother about controversies and clarifications.” In the last few years, Bhagwagar didn’t piggy bag only on big names to get work. He realised that he should stop focusing on big names and start focusing on new names because they are not only more challenging to handle, but they pay the publicists almost four to five times more money than established stars pay. “Big names don’t really pay; they make PRs work on a token amount or a discounted amount. For big names, the publicists don’t really create the brand, they just keep the brand in news and keep them rolling. By doing this, I became the highest charging publicist in Bollywood.”

A publicist understands the fine difference between good publicity and poor publicity and when to underplay their client and when exactly to overplay. And public relations are a highly competitive and aggressive profession. It’s a known fact that film publicists have greater access to studios and film sets and are in direct touch with the stars and studio workers. As Dale mentions, “Journalists want the power of pen and PRs want to control that pen. I prefer online media because that is the future and I am able to exercise more control.”

Nandita Puri says, “Earlier if you have noticed the big stars or the mega stars, they all had their own personal PR people. They were all journalists, especially editors who on the other side were PRs for one big star. Amitabh Bachchan, (...) Shabana Azmi... they all had their favourite journalist who actually were their PR person. These journalists would be present at their houses for all the events and they would personally do their side PR in their own magazine for which ever magazine they were the editors, columnists or writers. Then slowly the scene shifted as film journalists who left journalism and they started celebrity management for three to four stars in their fold. These journalists dropped out of journalism and became full time PRs of these stars.”

Puri explains that now what has happened is star management has gone completely in the hands of the PR companies. Earlier there were these editors who were bump chums of some stars and you know that these journalists will be very favourable to a particular star. When it became a PR agency managing the stars, there is actually very little journalist and star connection today. The coming of the advertorials and paid news has completely killed the ethics and at of film journalism in India. Puri narrates, “During the early years as film journalist, we used to call through their landline sometimes through their managers and PRs and met them up and had an interaction, but now the PR company does everything and you have to send questions via email. It is approved by them and sadly sometimes these stars also don’t see the questions. It is the PR company which approves and disapproves and put their own releases and vested interests in the writings. And these journalists know that the stars are not replying, it is the PR companies who are replying on their behalf. Very few journalists now directly talk over zoom or over phone call or met them for an interview.”

Gossip, scandals and breakups sell the most in Bollywood news. Bhagwagar admits that publicists are schemers. “They are the manipulators of the first order and I am no exception.” He questions that how many Bollywood journalist go studio hopping? Publicists are the only connection between the media and the stars. This has made PRs more influential and powerful than ever before. Says publicist Parul Chawla of Picture N Kraft, “It’s we who create the stars. I and my team are constantly in pursuit to grab the most fortuitous chances for each and every client of ours. I have always focused on building each of my clients inside out. It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation. The road to success and the road to failure are almost exactly the same, the difference lies in a simple word called ‘focus’.”

Many times, it is the duty of the publicists to pull out the stars from the mess they are in by giving them the right advice and doubling up as a spokesperson in front of the press. And in the time of paid new and advertorials, it is they who direct the journalist to write and project their clients in a certain way that they wish to. But some publicists feel that it would be foolish to believe that publicity alone can make a star. (...) There was a time when stars almost had a halo of sorts around them. Social media has replaced that with accessibility and accountability. Public figures today can’t expect to get away with a ‘no comment’. Their fans and supporters expect them to think. Mahrukh Inayet of Studio Talk PR says, “The person is as important as the persona. So, we advise clients to stay as close to who they really are.”

Publicists believe that for every company it is important to understand the story of the clients and they have to build a relationship and follow certain strategies to convert them into stars. As they work as the middle person between the stars and the media, they need to understand well as to how to project a person in a certain direction to bring out the star in them. Says Inayet “A complete analysis of who they are and where they stand in the ecosystem needs to be done. This intense and in-depth analysis helps us chart the way forward.” (...)

From the PR and client relationship point of view, publicists believe that trust is a huge factor that needs to be built. In order to be an effective publicist, a client must trust his/her publicist implicitly for the job given to him/her. A publicist needs to have their ear to the ground and interpret whispers, rumours and protect the client at all times. Bollywood publicists need to have the caliber to twist and turn situations in a jiffy. Making their clients a brand is their primary job. A successful publicist is one who can be innovative to create a successful star. A dynamic strategy is constantly evolving and customized to each client. In public relations, one size does not fit all'.

HUB INDIA

Mi era sfuggito ma ve lo segnalo ora. Il 5 novembre 2021, all'Accademia Albertina di Belle Arti di Torino, era stata inaugurata la mostra Hub India, allestita sino al 9 gennaio 2022 presso quattro sedi (Accademia, Museo D'Arte Orientale e Palazzo Madama; sino al 7 novembre 2021 nell'ambito di Artissima). Alle ore 17.00 era stato proiettato il documentario Sama: Symbols and gestures in contemporary art practices. Italy and India vol.1, diretto da Onir.

Onir presenta così la sua opera: 'It is a film installation that explores the exciting world of Contemporary Art in both the Indian sub-continent and in Italy, and develops an emotional bridge between the two countries, as an example of the historical-cultural and socio-economic extremes of the Euro-Asian continent'. Trailer.

Nel comunicato stampa diffuso da Fondazione Torino Musei, si legge: 

'Un documentario visionario e pionieristico che, attraverso una moltitudine di voci, esplora il mondo dell’arte contemporanea e dell’artigianato nel subcontinente indiano e in Italia. In questa prima “puntata”, un novero di artisti italiani contemporanei, tra cui Stefano Arienti, Alessandro Sciarroni, Sissi, Marzia Migliora tra gli altri, si alternano ad altrettanti artisti indiani, come Sheba Chhachhi, Tanya Goel, Rekha Rodwittiya e Ayesha Singh, offrendo al pubblico uno spaccato dell’estetica delle due regioni che mette in luce il rapporto tra tradizione e modernità, le pedagogie dell’Oriente e dell’Occidente, il genere, le archeologie e le politiche del tempo; i temi della migrazione, dell’esilio, del tempo e della memoria; la religiosità e il sincretismo e le specificità regionali nell’era della globalità. Sama: Symbols and gestures in contemporary art practices. Italy and India è un progetto di Myna Mukherjee e Davide Quadrio, diretto in India da Onir e scritto da Alessandra Galletta. (...) Il film è commissionato e prodotto da Arthub, Engendered, Ambasciata d'Italia a Nuova Delhi, Istituto Italiano di Cultura di Nuova Delhi (IIC) e Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR)'.

RASSEGNA STAMPA (aggiornata al 4 febbraio 2022)

- Hub India, Classical Radical, Manuela De Leonardis, Il Manifesto, 11 dicembre 2021: 'Il documentario raccoglie oltre cinquanta interviste ad artisti e intellettuali del subcontinente indiano e italiani, delineando una mappatura parallela incentrata sul significato di eredità culturale, identità, emigrazione, religione, stile, materia, tradizione, artigianato, globalizzazione. «Un esercizio di ricerca innescato da semplici domande che abbiamo posto agli artisti: come l’arte contemporanea preserva il passato, lo trasforma, lo contiene, lo osteggia?» – spiega Quadrio – «Cosa può dire ancora l’arte contemporanea? Cosa possiamo fare?»'.

- SAMA: Onir’s new documentary underlines the artistic parallels between India and Italy, Divya A., The Indian Express, 12 dicembre 2021: 

'The first volume of the Indo-Italian documentary film project on contemporary art, which has been in the making for over a year, is now complete. (...) Directed/scripted by National Award-winning filmmaker Onir, (...) the documentary film was screened in the Capital earlier this week. SAMA has been shot at over a dozen locations, and features over 50 artist studios and artisan centres spanning the length and breadth of the two countries nomadically: from the white salt deserts of the Rann to the waterways of the Sundarbans and Dal Lake in India, the mountains of Dolomiti to the historicity of Venice in Italy. Sama, which means ‘similar’ in Sanskrit and Latin languages, is commissioned and produced by ArtHub Asia, Engendered, presented by The Embassy of Italy in India, and The Italian Cultural Institute of New Delhi and supported by the Indian Council for Cultural Relations. (...) On the occasion, Vincenzo De Luca, the Ambassador of Italy to India, said: “The documentary underlines the parallels between Italy and Indian history. It’s an important piece of work with great potential.” The hour-long film explores the world of contemporary art in the Indian sub-continent as well as in Italy and lends context by investigating the signs and symbols surrounding them in history and culture. It offers a glimpse into the aesthetics of the two regions, while also excavating rare forms of craftsmanship. In that sense, it develops an emotional bridge between the two countries, which despite their differences and complexities, share a common ancestral connection. It also features art historians, experts, and critics. The film will now have its run at film festivals globally before releasing on an OTT platform in India. Other volumes of the film are in the pipeline, whereas the second volume is expected to release by early 2022'.

- Because India and Italy are good together, Sucheta Chakraborty, Mid-Day, 9 gennaio 2022:

'“ Italy and India have this long history of the very old as well as the very new,” says Myna Mukherjee. (...) Indian and South Asian art often occupies a static, exotified space in the international forum, feels Mukherjee, restricted into exclusive categories like classical or spiritual. “I always say that there is no one story to be said about India. If someone wants to engage with a civilisation that’s this old and has so many epicentres for culture, they have to be willing to embrace its complexity.” Working with [Davide] Quadrio, who has substantial experience with Asian cultures, having worked in China for 25 years, Mukherjee who has lived in the US for over two decades says there was trust, as “both of us had lived outside our respective countries and faced a kind of representational glitch from opposite ends of the spectrum.” (...) 

[Sama] is shot in over a dozen locations and features over 50 artist studios and artisan centres across Italy and India. (...) This research-based travel covered almost six months in India and two months in Italy in the middle of the pandemic. “Because it was during COVID times, we had access to a lot of artists who would otherwise be busy with exhibitions and travel,” says Mukherjee.

“It was an intimate, personal and profound project, for which we were able to have this moment of concentration,” agrees Quadrio. Both for an exhibition at Artissima and later the film, the project used a wide and diverse range of artistic voices from the very well-known to the comparatively younger, based both within and outside metropolitan cities, and working with global and local reference points. The focus was both on “what remains from history and also how the contemporary can help preserve but also carry on with traditions,” he says. “In that sense, we found that Italy and India were good together.”

Moreover, one of the most important things the film aims at, Mukherjee points out, “is the idea of demystifying the east while imbuing the west with more soul, so also reversing the colonial eye for art, while making sure that the reference point for pedagogies is not just the west.” With other volumes in the pipeline and a second edition slated for release early next year, the project is decidedly ambitious. “The amount of work that’s been put in and the volume of material that we have is unprecedented,” admits Quadrio. “It’s a project that is alive and can go on. Some of the conversations we had are already beautiful films in themselves.” (...)

For Onir, while this was an opportunity to rediscover this world of art and be on journey of finding artists, their work and connections, the project also provided an intellectual release and energy in the middle of the pandemic. His presence, he says, was also a way to explore how someone outside this world of art would experience it. “The real discovery happened at the editing table,” he shares.  “Shot in India first, the material was then sent to Italy; the Italian part of the filming done keeping in mind what had already been shot here. It’s such an effortless experience. You go from one world to another without even realising that you have done so”.'

Sama

- ‘SAMA’: Discovering India and Italy’s artistic parallels, Georgina Maddox, The Hindu, 4 febbraio 2022:

'“It isn’t a technical documentary, but a journey of experiencing and understanding the long history of art in the context of nature, culture, tradition,” explains Onir. (...) “For me, the beauty is in finding threads that are diverse while having a commonality because that is what humanity is all about.” It is like poetry, he adds, “where you use different languages to convey the same emotion. You see nature, tradition, patterns, forms and colours of, say, Kashmir resonate [with those] in Gujarat, while being different. This has changed the way I see form and design, and will affect the way I shoot films.”

Bridging conversations

Sama means ‘similar’ in Sanskrit and Latin - making it an apt title for the film and the intention behind it. Steered by cultural producers and curators Myna Mukherjee and Davide Quadrio, the film started as a deeper investigation into sensibilities that were first touched upon by the duo in their 2021 exhibition at Artissima. “I was already collaborating with Davide and it made sense to look at India and Italy because they are at the two ends of an artistic ‘trail’ of Asia and Europe,” says Mukherjee. “The artists we interviewed are in constant conversation with the very new and very old, and both countries have a long history of aesthetics that draw upon classical traditions and bring them in dialogue with contemporary styles.” The 70-minute film (...) was screened a little over a month ago for a select audience at the Italian Cultural Institute in New Delhi. As the audience tracked the slow movement of a shikara across Kashmir’s Dal Lake, the rising waters of Venice, the vigorous performance of an Italian dance troupe cut by a shot of an impassioned Bengali Baul singer, they also entered the quiet studios of artists in India and Italy, talking about their work and their process: from Italian glass sculptures to gorgeously painted Indian contemporary canvases, helping them connect the dots that is our cultural inheritance. “I have always been interested in the arts, but since I left Kolkata and [moved to] Mumbai to work in Bollywood, I lost touch with it,” shares Onir. “So, when Myna got in touch with me for this project, I immediately said yes. It was a way of exploring different art forms, meeting artists, and travelling.”

A collective whole

The film lends context to Indo-Italian contemporary art by investigating the semiotics (study of signs and symbols) surrounding them in history and culture. “SAMA allows the audience to glimpse the aesthetics of the two regions, imagined as a collective continuum of different narratives that echo artists’ voices across continents and heterogeneous contemporary art practices,” says Mukherjee. “They also excavate now-rare and valuable forms of craftsmanship in Italy and India.” The project involved 50 artists from both countries, and includes names such as photographer-filmmaker Sheba Chhachhi, folk singer Parvathy Baul, multimedia artist Ranbir Kaleka, designer Andrea Anastasio, artist-choreographer Alessandro Sciarroni, and artists Rekha Rodwittiya, Marzia Migliora, Stefano Arienti, and Tanya Goel. Onir will begin shooting volume two in July/August, with the second film concentrating on abstraction, religion and how it encounters arts and aesthetics. Meanwhile, SAMA will travel to global film festivals, before releasing on an OTT platform'.

Quanto alla mostra, vi riporto di seguito il comunicato stampa diffuso da Fondazione Torino Musei:

 

'Hub India è una prolifica esplorazione degli innumerevoli registri che caratterizzano l’arte contemporanea del subcontinente indiano, una regione di estrema importanza nell’Asia meridionale e che sta svolgendo un ruolo sempre più rilevante nel mondo globale. Con la presenza di oltre 65 artisti provenienti da dieci delle più importanti gallerie e musei indiani, il progetto si profila come il più ampio e significativo dialogo che l’arte contemporanea indiana abbia intrattenuto con il mondo occidentale in tempi recenti. Hub India, a cura di Myna Mukherjee e Davide Quadrio, nasce come progetto per Artissima Internazionale d’Arte Contemporanea di Torino per poi espandersi in una mostra tripartita realizzata in collaborazione con Fondazione Torino Musei e con l’Accademia Albertina di Belle Arti di Torino. 

Maximum Minimum @Artissima

Artissima 2021, in collaborazione con Emami Art, presenta Hub India - Maximum Minimum, un nuovo focus geografico che intende offrire una ricognizione sulle gallerie, le istituzioni e gli artisti attivi in un’area d’importanza capitale. In uno spazio dedicato verranno presentati i lavori di gallerie e istituzioni indiane che offriranno una veduta d’insieme di una sorprendente cultura visiva che rispecchia le innumerevoli polarità, contraddizioni e dualità che compongono l’India. Dall’antico spiritualismo del paese al suo moderno materialismo, dal passato coloniale alla crescente centralità nell’economia globale e alla rapida urbanizzazione, dal dogma alla tecnologia, dal marginale al mainstream, dai monumenti storici all’architettura contemporanea, dal normativo al radicale, Hub India - Maximum Minimum presenterà una miriade di storie e rappresentazioni del subcontinente.

In collaborazione NATURE MORTE New Delhi – GALLERY ESPACE New Delhi – EMAMI ART Kolkata – AKAR PRAKAR Kolkata, New Delhi – ART ALIVE New Delhi – LATITUDE 28 New Delhi – SHRINE EMPIRE New Delhi.

Classical Radical @Palazzo Madama, MAO e Accademia Albertina

Classical Radical è una mostra in tre sedi che si sviluppa nelle sedi di Palazzo Madama – Museo Civico d’Arte Antica, del MAO Museo d’Arte Orientale e dell’Accademia Albertina di Belle Arti di Torino. Classical Radical presenta opere indiane contemporanee e moderne che esplorano i lasciti del passato e l’antichità nel qui e ora sociologico. Come le opere d’arte contemporanee illuminano, complicano e si riappropriano dell’eredità? Come si pone l’arte contemporanea nel variegato panorama di religioni e storie, e quali residui di motivi, stili e idee sono sopravvissuti attraverso i millenni fino ai giorni nostri? Le opere selezionate rappresentano uno spaccato di generi, medium e processi che vanno dai disegni e dipinti alle miniature e sculture, terrecotte e metalli, dipinti su carta e su tela, stampe, incisioni e opere digitali e virtuali, in un tentativo di analizzare le eredità classiche e tradizionali attraverso una nuova lente. Una ricerca a tutto campo che offusca le polarità di religione, casta o razza, Asia ed Europa, figurazione e astrazione per costruire uno spettro ampio di voci che vanno dai maestri moderni e contemporanei alle avanguardie, passando per gli artisti indipendenti appena scoperti. Più stratificato e complesso di una panoramica, questo percorso espositivo offre una lente caleidoscopica che sposta la percezione e sfida la stasi in modi elaborati, evocativi e mai riduttivi. (...)

In partnership con Kiran Nadar Museum of Art (KNMA). In collaborazione LATITUDE 28 New Delhi – AKAR PRAKAR Kolkata, New Delhi – ART ALIVE New Delhi – EMAMI ART Kolkata – GALLERY ESPACE New Delhi – SHRINE EMPIRE New Delhi – NATURE MORTE New Delhi – SAKSHI ART Mumbai – JHAVERI CONTEMPORARY Mumbai – VADEHRA ART New Delhi – VOLTE Mumbai.

Palazzo Madama - Museo Civico d’Arte Antica | Disruptive Confluences (Confluenze perturbanti)

La mostra a Palazzo Madama esplora il sincretismo e l’ibridismo attraverso opere per la maggior parte tridimensionali che collegano e contrappongono la straordinaria collezione del museo con la storia del subcontinente indiano, suggerendo complicate storie di scambi commerciali e religiosi, dominazioni, residui imperialisti ed evoluzioni sincretiche. Dando vita a un immaginario ibrido, al tempo stesso velato e provocatorio, la mostra rivela narrazioni e rapporti da una prospettiva eurasiatica, ma capace di porsi in dialogo e creare riflessioni significative con i duemila anni di storia di un edificio, che concilia una porta romana con una corte medievale e una scalinata barocca. In questo evidenziandosi quale storico luogo di riflessione di contesti ed esperienze anche profondamente differenti, ma alla ricerca di matrici comuni per individuare nuovi assi di dialogo.

Artisti: Jayashree Chakravarty, Ranbir Kaleka, Manjunath Kamath, Tayeba Begum Lipi, Benitha Perciyal, G Ravinder Reddy, Himmat Shah, Gulam Mohammed Sheikh, Prasanta Sahu, Ayesha Singh, LN Tallur.

MAO - Museo d’Arte Orientale | Residues & Resonance (Residui & Risonanze)

La mostra al MAO comprende opere del rinascimento contemporaneo che iconizzano e al tempo stesso obliterano lo stesso classicismo a cui fanno riferimento. I lavori sono radicati in un’eredità che esamina stili tradizionali, scuole e generi e si spinge oltre per stabilire con essi una relazione, un dialogo. Mentre gli interessi sono mutati con i capricci del tempo, le forme di queste opere hanno conservato ossessivamente pattern simili, risonanti di residui del passato. (...) Uno dei punti forti della mostra è una sezione radicale di neo-miniaturisti che prendono a prestito le decorazioni evocative, stilizzate e gemmate dei tradizionali stili miniaturistici e dei dipinti vasli, sovvertendole per esplorare modi in cui espandere e smantellare il vocabolario di uno stile apparentemente insulare. Anche l’arte della Regione himalayana offrirà grandi suggestioni, grazie all’installazione di una serie di opere dell’artista Paula Sengupta dal titolo The plain of Aspiration, un progetto che parla della diaspora dei tibetani fuggiti dal loro paese in seguito alla partenza del Dalai Lama nel 1959 e del tentativo di conservare anche altrove, attraverso la memoria, il loro stile di vita e la loro cultura. I lavori di Sengupta attingono fortemente alla tradizione dell’artigianato tessile e al simbolismo religioso tibetani e, nelle gallerie del MAO, vengono accostate alle opere della sezione dedicata alle copertine lignee intagliate.

Artisti: Waseem Ahmad, Khadim Ali, Anindita Bhattacharya, Sakti Burman, Sudipta Das, Priyanka D’Souza, Baaraan Ijlal, Manjunath Kamath, Puneet Kaushik, Samanta Batra Mehta, Piyali Sadhukhan, Paula Sengupta, Yugal Kishore Sharma, Nilima Sheikh, The Singh Twins, Waswo X Waswo.

Accademia Albertina di Belle Arti | Multitudes & Assemblages (Multitudini & Assemblaggi)

La traiettoria delle arti visive in India è caratterizzata da molteplici transizioni; abbraccia e interiorizza i discorsi più ampi del colonialismo, del nazionalismo e del modernismo internazionale. Si relaziona con le tradizioni visive alla luce del postmodernismo e cerca di legittimare la propria posizione nell’arena contemporanea della produzione d’arte. Narrazioni multiple si snodano simultaneamente, come elementi tattili che si rifiutano di perdere la loro realtà, presenza, velocità, calore o umidità, come incongrue testimonianze di un punto focale in un allestimento che mira a presentare una molteplicità di possibilità. Evocando più la nostalgia che la storia, queste voci si levano a volte all’unisono e a volte in una reciproca tensione, ai lati opposti del tempo, come uno specchio, ribaltando lo sguardo su un familiare ma radicale pastiche di liberazione, ecologia, urbanizzazione, migrazione, femminismo, genere, soggettività e sensazione.

Artisti: Harshit Agrawal in collaboration with 64/1, Amina Ahmed, Chandra Bhattacharjee, Sakti Burman, Sheba Chhachhi, Jogen Chowdhury, Sudipta Das, Priyanka D’Souza, Tanya Goel, Laxma Goud, Ganesh Haloi, Manjunath Kamath, Puneet Kaushik, Bharti Kher, Martand Khosla, Neerja Kothari, Balbir Krishan, Rahul Kumar, Tayeba Begum Lipi, Shruti Mahajan + Ravindra G. Rao, Paresh Maity, Debasish Mukherjee, Dr.Uttam Pacharne, Manish Pushkale, Mona Rai, Vajay Raut, Rekha Rodwittiya, Debanjan Roy, Prasanta Sahu, Wardha Shabbir, Shailesh BR, Shambhavi, Gulam Mohammed Sheikh, Nilima Sheikh, LN Tallur, Gopa Trivedi. (...)

Hub India è un progetto di Arthub & Engendered presentato in partnership con Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, Fondazione Torino Musei, Artissima, Emami Art, Palazzo Madama, MAO e Accademia Albertina. Con il sostegno di Ambasciata d'Italia a Nuova Delhi, Istituto Italiano di Cultura di Nuova Delhi (IIC), Consolato Generale dell’India a Milano, Città di Torino'. 

Hub India, Classical Radical, Manuela De Leonardis, Il Manifesto, 11 dicembre 2021:

'Ma quante storie non dette si celano dietro l’apparenza, per lo più tra le mura domestiche in una società patriarcale. Dare voce a quel mondo sommerso attraverso la trascrizione grafica delle onde sonore, utilizzando le vibrazioni del rosso e dell’azzurro - due colori dalla forte valenza simbolica - è una priorità per (Piyali) Sadhukhan che va ben oltre la ricerca estetica. A dare forza al gesto dell’artista femminista di Calcutta (...) c’è (...) l’utilizzo di migliaia di braccialetti di vetro rotti e riassemblati sulla tela. (...) 

Questa stimolante kermesse guarda al subcontinente senza divisione di confini, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh e regione himalayana, coinvolgendo artisti multidisciplinari (...) e numerose gallerie, soprattutto di New Delhi, Calcutta e Mumbai, tra cui la storica Nature Morte di Peter Nagy. (...)

Denso di spunti critici, il dialogo tra queste opere contemporanee e le antichità dei musei torinesi crea un ulteriore corto circuito visivo, come nella sala di Palazzo Madama con le sue pareti damascate e la profusione d’oro zecchino quando ci si imbatte nella toeletta di Tayeba Begum Lipi (1969), artista del Bangladesh e co-fondatrice di Britto Arts Trust con cui parteciperà a documenta15. Al di là della patina di apparente leziosità, Once Upon A Time svela un messaggio neanche troppo implicito, con le centinaia di lamette da barba d’acciaio inossidabile che rappresentano non solo un pattern ma la struttura stessa del lavoro. Una tensione che strizza l’occhio alla materia portando l’osservatore a riflettere su questioni di genere, così come nelle sculture di Manjunath Kamath (Mangalore 1972) dove la violenza è percepibile nell’atto stesso di ricucire vecchie cicatrici nella formulazione di una nuova versione degli idoli in cui gli strati di terracotta, ceramica, cemento e acciaio sono come pagine di storia. 

Analizza l’ambiente rurale l’artista Prasanta Sahu (1968), incentrando su questo tema il progetto Mapping craters (2020-21): un’installazione di 60 calchi negativi in gesso, numerati, che ricordano i reperti archeologici. In questo archivio (sono presenti anche disegni, acquarelli e fotografie) offerto come cibo su una tavola imbandita, c’è la documentazione di un intero anno che l’artista ha trascorso fianco a fianco con un contadino senza terra nel villaggio di Amdahara Birbhum (Bengala orientale). Ritroviamo l’impronta degli attrezzi che sembrano arcaici ma vengono usati tuttora, dei cibi, di frutta e verdura, dei cibi, presenze rese visibili attraverso l’assenza. Una metafora del lavoro, del tempo e della fatica di chi coltiva e produce gli alimenti destinati alla collettività, che non compare nello scenario più ampio delle politiche del cibo. Per Prasanta Sahu che vive a Santiniketan (lì dove il poeta Tagore creò, nel 1901, una scuola a contatto con la natura nell’eremo fondato quarant’anni prima da suo padre Devendranath, sostenitore della modernizzazione del Bengala) questo approccio analitico serve a sottolineare il grande contrasto - l’incomunicabilità totale - tra i due mondi, rurale e urbano, della società indiana. 

Contrasti che investono anche altri aspetti sociali come è evidente negli stendardi ricamati, The plain of Aspiration (rivisitazione delle tangka tibetane) in cui Paula Sengupta (1967) porta la vita di tutti i giorni, così come l’artista pakistano Waseem Ahmed (1976) che con un’ironia sottile affronta nelle sue miniature i conflitti religiosi e politici.

Richiamano alla memoria le antiche miniature anche le fotografie seppiate della serie A Visitor to the Court su cui Waswo X. Waswo (1953) è intervenuto dipingendo elementi decorativi colorati che le rendono pezzi unici. Nell’autoproclamarsi erede della raffinatissima cultura moghul, il fotografo-scrittore (autore di India Poems: The Photographs, 2006) crea delle mise-en-scène in cui gioca sullo stereotipo dell’orientalista, ribaltando così quel rapporto di potere costruito dall’immaginario europeo del mondo «altro» (l’Oriente)'.

IL FENOMENO SALMAN KHAN

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In questo periodo sono in vena di revival, quindi vi propongo una serie di articoli, pubblicati nel 2010 e nel 2011, che tentano di analizzare il fenomeno Salman Khan. Dal 2018 l'aura di Sallu sembra un po' appannata, ma la superstar non è nuova a cicli di tonfi e resurrezioni. In una carriera ormai lanciata a ripercorrere le orme di un certo Rajinikanth, non è difficile pronosticare nuovi clamorosi successi. Mi porto avanti rinfrescando la memoria circa le ragioni che hanno consentito a Salman Khan di incendiare il botteghino in quegli anni, ragioni valide a spiegare anche gli incassi stellari delle sue pellicole sino a tutto il 2017 (Ek Tha Tiger, Kick, Bajrangi Bhaijaan, Sultan - solo per citare i titoli più interessanti).

EDITORIALE, Aroon Purie, India Today, 1 novembre 2010

'Bollywood is dominated by the trinity of Khans - Shah Rukh, Aamir and Salman. Though united by their surnames, they have nothing in common either in style or in appeal. The first is the reigning superstar, a fulltime showman. The second is the so-called thinking star. The third, the subject of our cover story this week, is the shirtless wonder whose mass appeal surpasses all the others. (...) 

Most often, the bare-chested Khan is in the news for all the wrong reasons, whether it is for shooting blackbuck or for rash driving or for courting some of Bollywood's most beautiful women. He is the most adored bad boy of the industry and symbolises the old style Bollywood masculinity. He has that habit of putting his foot in his mouth whenever he is not using it for kicking baddies in his films. He is the action hero who has reduced the distance between the make-believe and the real. He's also surprisingly versatile. He started his career as a charming loverboy and then became the first Khan in Bollywood to discover the sixpack. He's got great comic timing and is not afraid of making a fool of himself onscreen. (...) 

He is our cover subject not just because he is the biggest hit-maker of the year. As this year's Entertainer Number One, he also dominates the small screen. The Salman part of the Khan market is flourishing. (...) 

Yet for a superstar, he lives fairly simply. His parents live in an apartment above him, and he's always willing to part with his things, be it money for medical treatment for the needy or even a favourite pair of boots. Apparently, he sleeps only for three hours a day. That should be good news for his fans as well as the industry. His waking hours have become the biggest source of escapism for the millions who swarm the multiplexes. And those hours earn him millions. Obviously, being bad pays'.

THE GOOD BAD BOY, Kaveree Bamzai, India Today, 1 novembre 2010

'The biggest paycheck in Bollywood this year has landed. It reached a star who's 5-foot 9-3/4 inches and weighs 78 kg. He dresses in clothes chosen by his two sisters and lives a floor below his parents. He sleeps for three hours a day and eats five meals daily. He's Salman Khan. And he's made Rs 170 crore and still counting from Dabangg, Rs 24 crore from Bigg Boss 4, and Rs 15 crore from three endorsements signed earlier this year. He is at the top of the entertainment game, measured in the only language Mumbai understands: money. (...) 

For someone who started work at 14 and whose first pay was Rs 75 as a background dancer, becoming the star of Bollywood's second biggest hit ever has not been easy. The pinnacle has come 22 years after he began as a doe-eyed, silken-haired 45-kg son of a famous father, a second lead in the tepid Biwi Ho To Aisi. Salman has reason to be pleased though he cannot look you in the eye, mind you. A little accident with a surgery to fix the unflattering pouches under his eyes has ensured that he cannot take off his dark glasses for another week. But as the star sits on his black leather couch, the centrepiece of his one-bedroom flat in Mumbai, with the steaming cup of coffee to be replaced by successive glasses of Bacardi and Coke as the evening wears on, he knows his fans have seen worse. They have seen him wearing a bikini in Baaghi, dancing with a towel between his legs in Mujhse Shaadi Karogi, being a "manly" Marilyn Monroe in Jaan-e-Mann and in Dabangg, romancing a girl who was a year old when he began his career. 

And they are not surprised that he now commands Rs 5 crore for each of his five endorsements; that he's taken the ratings of the opening episode of Bigg Boss 4 to a high of 4.83, bettered only by Amitabh Bachchan's Kaun Banega Crorepati 4 TRP of 6.21; and that his next yet-to-be-shot film is being sold at Rs 75 crore. The bhai who never grew up seems to have finally become the boy who can do no wrong. Or even if he does, it is quickly forgiven. Perhaps because he is seen as someone with his heart in the right place and his tongue in the wrong place. As an equal opportunity offender, who, if he is unprofessional, is so with everyone big or small. As a loveable lout who may be feudal and flawed but is still very funny. As a star who is less about the brand and more about the body. Which may explain why while everybody is busy wearing branded clothes, he's happy taking them off. 

Perhaps it's because the audience watching him suspects that behind the bluster is a boy who can still get slapped by his father, scriptwriter Salim Khan, and still stands to attention when he's on the phone. In many ways, Salman is the retrosexual man every boy would like to be. His brothers are his best friends and despite having dated four stunningly beautiful professional actors, he still believes that women should not "expose" onscreen. Unlike middle class darlings Shah Rukh Khan and Aamir Khan, film scholar Shohini Ghosh believes Salman's films echo our more complicated "good and bad times". Movies like Tere Naam and Garv portray him as a brooding hero while even in his most raucous comedies he often loses the girl or gets trumped by another star. Like the young Amitabh Bachchan, despite his elite upbringing, he has a common touch. He can play the folk hero of the masses as much as he can embody the rock star swagger.

Salman hasn't worked with too many star directors and he still cannot remember the dialogue of Pyaasa that he and director Sajid Khan had to learn in acting classes with Daisy Irani, but he seems to have found a new commitment to work. Always known more for his body than his brains, he is not only completing movies in one schedule to maintain continuity of physicality and character, but he has also reserved the right of final edit. "When I see a film now, I see it from the point of view of the audience, not myself. Yuvvraaj was 25 minutes too long, London Dreams would have been super 35 minutes less, and for Veer, I just needed more shooting dates. It's my fault that I didn't put my foot down. But I didn't whether out of respect or not wanting a misunderstanding. Perhaps they would have been worse if I had put my foot down," he says.

It is rare to find a star so unaccustomed to asserting his veto. Perhaps because Salman regards himself as a worker bee, who's broken every bone in his body, save his head, at least three times. He's always worked, whether it was as an assistant to Shashilal Nair for Rs 30 a day or as a model trying to maintain a Rs 300 bank balance. Which is why, among the Khans, he's made the most films - 71 compared to 57 for Shah Rukh and 36 for Aamir. Now the madness has a method. Still, don't expect him to come to work before 11 a.m., kiss onscreen ("why mix business with pleasure," he murmurs), or play a villain ("people need to see heroes"). Also make allowances for the days when he won't want to shoot, or will do so only with dark glasses on, because his eyes are puffy. But then once he's on the set, surrounded by his toys (an all-terrain bike, a bicycle, perhaps his Yamahas R6 and R1, and his four dogs, the oddly named Veer, My Love, Saint and Handsum) expect him to do anything the director demands (...).

He sees a reason for the phenomenal success of Wanted last year, which was like Ghajini before it, a southern import, and re-established the action genre in Bollywood which involves heroes walking through doors and fighting battles with bare hands. "We've had the angry young man, the action hero who would fight for his family or neighbourhood, the romantic hero, the rom-com loser hero. There had to be a reaction," he says. (...) "I believe the entertainment industry is for children or for the child in everyone. Somebody wants to grow up like you, somebody wants to be you, somebody wants to remember their youth by you," he says.

He's not a great fan of change. "I get attached to things. It took me 35 years to go from the floor above to my house here. And that happened only because Sohail (his younger brother) took over my room when I went on a world tour," he says. Rather than being seen as a provider at large for his family, he believes they have been a great support to him. "I have no responsibilities. My family takes care of me more than I take care of them. They've always supported me," he says. Especially when he's in trouble, which can vary from being in Jodhpur Central Jail for six days in 2007 as Prisoner No. 343 in the blackbuck case to 17 days in Thane Central Jail in the hit-and-run case in 2002. His family bristles at the thought of being seen as parasites: "People behave as if he's been parking money in our accounts. No. The greatest thing about him is that he hasn't alienated us from his success. He wants us to enjoy it with him," says brother, actor Arbaaz who is also the producer of Dabangg.

Film critic Nasreen Munni Kabir says Salman doesn't show himself in real life as the perfect, intelligent man but as a feckless fellow who bumbles through life learning from his mistakes as he continuously makes them. "He becomes human to us in a more meaningful way than the high achievers," she points out. As Salman himself says, "Some people think I'm a total jerk. And some people love me to death." He also has a habit of loving to death, as all accounts of him stalking Aishwarya Rai at the height of their romance indicate. Salman seems to have become philosophical about his love life. "You get somebody better for you. That person gets somebody better for them," he says in his famously cryptic way. He has finally learnt to move on romantically, though there is the odd fixation he has with casting lookalikes of his one-time girlfriends. His father puts it more poetically: "Salman suffers from divine dissatisfaction."

For someone who grew up idolising Sanjay Dutt, (...) he's quite impressed by his own fitness. "My body is better than it ever was," he says, looking at himself in a mirrored wall conveniently next to the sofa on which he receives guests like a mini-head of state. "The only fat I have is under my eyes," he says, denying he ever went in for hair grafting but quietly writing the number of the Dubai doctor who did the honours in case you need it. He keeps himself fit, whether by swimming, playing cricket or football, or simply trekking or cycling to work. He sleeps three hours a day, usually by 5 in the morning. "Either my mind wakes up and my body is tired. Or my body wakes up and my mind says 'go to sleep'. Sometimes both are sleepy and I'm wide awake." And sometimes he wakes up weeping, his pillow wet, dreaming of his days at The Scindia School, Gwalior.

He's had a chequered academic career, weaving in and out of St. Anne's High School, Mumbai; The Scindia School; St. Stanislaus High School, Mumbai; and St. Xavier's, Mumbai, from where he was thrown out. Why? "Attendance. I always had that problem," he mumbles. He dropped out of third year at Elphinstone College, deciding not to take an exam one day because a cricket match seemed more interesting. He also gave up the idea of admission to the JJ School of Art because he thought the crowd was too "arty" for someone who was the proud possessor of a single pair of Wranglers bought by his mother's brother, Tiger Uncle, from Germany. "I wore them until they tore," he says, recalling a time when the family was short of cash. His father agrees. "Remember I struggled for 10 years as an actor before I began writing.(...)."

A Bandra boy who would often attend midnight mass with his gang after a drinking session, Salman has grown up with a Hindu mother, a Muslim father, and a Catholic stepmother. In many ways, he is Everyman. "What you see is what you get," says director Farah Khan. (...) "He's never stopped a movie or not completed it even if he knew it was a turkey in the making. When he's good, there's no one like him."

As he contemplates marriage ("I'd like to have children"), a post-retirement career involving painting and working with his charity, the Being Human Foundation, the coolest thing about the always underrated Khan is that he's happy even with his lack of inches. "It's just a bit taller than the heroines and shorter than the villain." Because, of course, it's fun to beat up the bigger guy. Isn't that what heroes do?'.

SOME PEOPLE THINK I'M A TOTAL JERK, India Today, 1 novembre 2010

(L'intervista è piuttosto insipida, e ne riporto un breve estratto solo per gossip. Gli intenditori capiranno)

'So are you ready to finally get married?

No, not now. I'm not ready. I don't feel like it. Nevertheless, whenever I've been in a relationship, I have always wanted to get married. But I would get cold feet. I would panic if I started thinking about it too much.

Who were you in a relationship with?

All the people that you know about. What's the point of naming them? Everyone is happy, everyone is married.

Not everyone.

Yeah, Somy (Ali) is not.

And Katrina ...

Katrina is too young to get married'.

BOLLYWOOD'S ROCKSTAR, Anupama Chopra, Open, 2 settembre 2011

'He’s rash and unpredictable, and the jury is still out on his acting skills. So what makes Salman Khan such a force to reckon with? (...) 

The intriguing thing is that he can’t act. Or at least, he prefers not to. There have been occasional flashes of craft, but mostly, Salman seems content to play one persona: a charming, irreverent, but morally upright superman who invariably drops his shirt (...). In a recent interview, he said that he chooses to do films that he himself would buy a ticket for. Over the past few years, these have been loud, largely mindless action movies in which he crunches bodies while delivering signature whistle-worthy dialogues. When I asked in an interview why he repeated himself in every role, his response was: “Why? Do you have a problem with my personality?”. 

His films have become so successful that Salman is now his own genre or franchise. He’s cinematic comfort food - you go into a theatre to watch him do the same thing over and over again. The story, the setting, the direction, the co-star, they are all irrelevant. 

Intriguingly, Salman has been an A-list star for over two decades without the consistent support of big production houses or strong scripts. Shah Rukh Khan has been the poster boy for the Chopras (Yash and Aditya) and Karan Johar. Aamir Khan, with uncanny instinct, has picked the best stories. But Salman has pretty much winged it. He prefers to work with friends and family. His relationships dictate his projects. There is no strategy or long-term planning. His personal life is equally haphazard. He’s had a slew of famous girlfriends, scandals, brushes with the police, the mafia and even stints in jail. And through it all, Salman stands tall. 

What makes Salman Bollywood’s Teflon man? Why does nothing ever stick? Why do viewers forgive him everything, including allegations of abuse and drunk driving and shoddy projects like Ready and Veer? My thesis is that Salman functions as Hindi cinema’s last Rockstar Hero. Aamir and Shah Rukh are wonderfully charismatic actors, but only Salman feels subversive and deliciously dangerous. He’s 100 per cent attitude. He’s our fantasy of a life lived large and without regrets. With him, there are no half-measures. Every facet is epic. So, he’s moody, but also so generous that he doesn’t blink before giving away watches worth lakhs to friends; he’s staggeringly eligible, and yet, unable to sustain a relationship - and therefore also lonely, so he often paints furiously into the dawn; he’s unpredictable, and yet, reliable like a rock. Salman is all testosterone, but also all heart. He hasn’t had a timid day in his life. He’s fierce and determinedly unlayered. Above all, Salman has no sub-text. What you see is what you get - both onscreen and off. 

Is Salman really all of this? I wouldn’t know. Over 20-odd years, I’ve only interviewed him thrice. I’ve enjoyed a few (too few) of his films. While I am intrigued by the cult of Bhai, I am not a convert. But clearly, I’m a minority. Bollywood’s number crunchers are predicting a Rs 60-crore opening five-day weekend for Bodyguard. This isn’t an actor. It’s an experience'.

KING OF BOLLYWOOD, Aroon Purie, India Today, 19 settembre 2011

'He's an actor who can't really act, his dancing is somewhat peculiar, at 45 he's kind of ageing, he has a great body but so do his peers. So, what makes this actor a superstar? I think it's because Salman Khan is a cool dude. Women, of course, drool over his body but I believe his fans love him because of his bad/good boy image, his nonchalance and above all, because he doesn't ever seem to take himself too seriously. He's the king of two other very successful Khans because he has, particularly in the last year, set the box office cash registers ringing like never before. In an industry where receipts at the box office, more than awards or critical acclaim, are the ultimate measure of success, Salman Khan truly stands out. (...) 

He was the first of the big stars to take off his shirt and bare his toned upper body-waxed chest, bulging biceps and enviable six-pack-way back in the 1990s when it was hardly fashionable to do so. It is a routine he has stuck to religiously since. (...) Other filmmakers have a formula for genres like romantic comedy, thrillers or slice of life but in Salman's recent films, he's the formula. That's the USP (Unique Selling Point). There are set pieces which Salman will do in his films and that's what keeps the fans coming back for more. (...) 

He has an uncanny ability to bond with the masses both off and on screen. (...) When asked about his success, Salman was quick to say, "It's no big deal. You can't go mad about these things." As always, the cool dude!'.

SALMAN KHAN ON BODYGUARD'S SUCCESS, Shilpa Rathnam, Nishat Bari, Kaveree Bamzai, Gunjeet Sra, India Today, 19 settembre 2011

'At any given time, there will be a gaggle of at least 50 people standing outside his home in Galaxy Apartments, in Bandra, Mumbai, waiting for help. Papers are sent in to his one-bedroom ground floor apartment, money or assurances are sent out. Khan insists on wearing simple clothes in his films, usually vests, shirts that are easy to clone, blue jeans or as in most of Ready, bermudas. "I make sure I wear one pair of shoes throughout a movie," he says, "otherwise children start harassing their parents to get them more." (...) "Parents have to want you as their son, youngsters have to think they can be like you, children have to idolise you," he says. (...) 

There's a more studied analysis of his appeal. Khan represents a certain kind of virile masculinity that no longer exists in Indian males but is something they aspire to achieve. He is single, with a string of beautiful girlfriends. He combines rural mobility with urban ideas, something that Govinda or Mithun Chakraborty were never able to do. The dichotomy comes from his small town roots (he was born in Indore and spent every summer there until he was old enough for regular school) and his status as the son of one of Bollywood's most successful screenwriters, Salim Khan. Since more people are migrating to cities from villages, they idealise it, says sociologist Sanjay Srivastava. Even his wealth is subdued, out of the public gaze. (...) 

Khan cashes in on this outsider-makes-it-big image by building his characters along the same aspirations, with names such as Radhey, Chulbul Pandey and Lovely Singh. He's both ordinary and special; Indian and not NRI; loyal to family, friends and servants, and emphatically Indian in style, dressing in neo-urban flash, with earrings and bracelet, says film scholar Rachel Dwyer. 

In an industry where his contemporaries want to be presented as youngsters, he doesn't pretend. His hair is courtesy a weave from a doctor in Dubai whose number he shares freely, his body is the result of constant hard work, and the eyes are often accompanied by bags. Then there is the visceral action. (...) 

He's the 70s-80s working class hero with a new noughties irreverence. Hence the break into comedy often in the middle of an intense action scene. (...) He observes people around him and remembers the simple things. (...)  "Most things I do are improvised from what I see in real life," he says. "There's nothing original." (...) 

He's developed a shrewd business sense too. (...) He endorses seven brands. (...) His Being Human T-shirts are the most pirated across India. (...) There's Bigg Boss for another season on Colors, co-hosted with friend Sanjay Dutt. Plus the movie business can only grow. (...) 

The fans adore him. (...) In a marketed fragmented by the rise of regional cinemas and divided by rising ticket prices, he is a powerful unifier. He's the Khan who can do no wrong'.

INTERVISTA, Kaveree Bamzai, India Today, 19 settembre 2011

'Salman Khan is recuperating in New Jersey, USA, after a complicated surgery to ease a nerve disorder called Trigeminal Neuralgia, which had been causing him excruciating pain for a year. He spoke on the phone about the enormous success of Bodyguard and capping a hattrick of blockbusters.

Q. So how does it feel?

You can't go mad about these things. It's the festive season. The past three films have done well. The business has grown. Aabadi badti ja rahi hai (the population is growing), even if I'm not contributing to it. There's a baby born every 30 seconds or something, right? But seriously I feel happy that a film I selected is something people liked. I hope that never goes wrong.

Q. What's the secret of your success?

I no longer do a film for the wrong reasons. I have to be convinced ethically and morally. Both the director and I have to be on the same page. There are just five songs in most films these days and they have to be amazing. There has to be a twist in the screenplay. The editing has to be crisp. Your hard work should show, but effortlessly. It has to be a subject people relate to. You have to approach the film like a member of the audience. When it's being narrated to you, you should enjoy it.

Q. What are the things you will never do in a movie?

Never kiss the girl on screen. I feel awkward. First, remember, it's primarily a family audience. And second, I learnt this a long time ago, every man's wife or girlfriend is for himself. He doesn't want to share her.

Q. Why is it so important to have a shirtless scene?

I think the whole point is when people see it they think if this guy can take his shirt off, so can we. But you have to prepare yourself mentally. I had just 15 days to work on my body for the climactic fight of Bodyguard. And I would work on every muscle of my body two/three times a week. I would have developed a superb body if I had three months, but squeezing it into 15 days can be harmful. Also, as you grow older, your metabolic rate slows down.

Q. You seem to have become far more serious about your work now.

You have to be. Ticket prices have increased. Your fans expect something. You can't let them down.

Q. And you're more involved?

Yes, I do think of some of the lines and jokes. I enjoy the process of composing music. The first time I hear a song, it has to bring a smile to my lips. You have to tap your feet and be able to sing the song'.

Vi segnalo inoltre l'articolo King Salman, firmato da Bharati Dubey e pubblicato da The Times of India il 12 giugno 2011. Il sito non consente di copiare il testo.

Vedi anche Salman Khan: The Hit Machine

THE NEW FACE OF FILM

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Il numero del 27 ottobre 2003 di Time Asia offriva una serie di articoli piuttosto interessanti dedicati al cinema popolare hindi, incluse cinque corpose interviste concesse da Amitabh Bachchan, Aamir Khan, Aishwarya Rai, Ram Gopal Varma e Rahul Bose. In copertina, Ash fasciata da un elegantissimo abito di Giorgio Armani.

Vi propongo di seguito i testi per due ragioni. Perché sarebbe un peccato non poterli più consultare nel caso in cui Time decidesse di cancellare o criptare lo storico. E perché è commovente l'entusiasmo mostrato dai giornalisti - occidentali - e dalle celebrità intervistate che, quasi vent'anni fa ormai, ritenevano di scorgere l'alba di una invasione indiana nel cinema mondiale. 

QUEEN OF BOLLYWOOD, Alex Perry

'The burly British film crew gazes in wonder at the image of the stunning young Indian woman on the playback monitor. As her jeweled sari radiates ruby and amber across their faces, the woman smiles out at her audience, stifles a giggle and draws butterfly-wing lashes down over olive-green eyes. A pause, she looks up, throws her head back and laughs, then withdraws into another coy smile. The shot, five bewitching seconds that may not even make the final edit of Bride and Prejudice, ends. The crew doesn't move. Without a word, the tape is rewound and another viewing begins. It is perhaps the seventh or eighth in a row. "Marvelous," sighs an assistant director. His fellow crew members nod in vigorous agreement. Behind them producer Deepak Nayar beams at director Gurinder Chadha. "After this," chuckles Chadha, "she'll be able to do anything she wants." (...)

Chadha says her theft of Austen will work because Bollywood shares themes with Western art of a more innocent age. "When you see how perfectly the plot of Pride and Prejudice fits Bollywood, you see how Austen and Bollywood use the same language of joy, love, family and sadness that's so uplifting and involving, and so rare and different from Hollywood today," she says. "I think the audience will eat it up." For (Mira) Nair, the explanation is even simpler. "The West is suddenly waking up, noticing what the rest of the world has been watching all these years and working out where it came from." She predicts more international exposure for Bollywood as Hollywood realizes the commercial sense of combining the world's two biggest film audiences. (...)

The film world has heard rumors of an Indian invasion for years. In London in particular, the success of cross-cultural writers like Vikram Seth, Hari Kunzru and Monica Ali, Andrew Lloyd Webber's Bombay Dreams, department store Selfridges' decision to adopt a Bollywood theme, and a host of wildly successful Indian TV comedies has long convinced the British public that it was set for a Bollywood bonanza. Often, the sheer size of the Indian film industry - releasing an average 1,000 films a year, compared with Hollywood's 740; and attracting an annual world audience, from Kuala Lumpur to Cape Town, of 3.6 billion, compared with Hollywood's 2.6 billion - made it seem as though the West was the last to catch on. But even though Chinese film boomed with Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, somehow the Indian wave never broke. And although Indian films showed in theaters from Singapore to San Francisco, the truth was that few Asians, Europeans or Americans outside the vast South Asian immigrant community actually saw them.

The reason was not hard to fathom. However deep the artistic void that gave the world Death Wish V or Police Academy 7, Bollywood has long outdone Hollywood for formula and cliché. After a two-decade-long golden age that produced films such as Mother India (1957) and Sholay (1975), the industry slipped into a succession of hackneyed action flicks and copycat song-and-dance romances made under a factory ethic in which actors worked on five, 10, even 15 films at a time. Remakes and plagiaries of Hollywood were routine, scripts were almost unheard of, and cast and crew often took the same characters, shots and dance steps from one production to another. The love stories were particularly indistinct: thousands of boys met thousands of girls (songs of joy!), broke up (songs of sorrow!), reunited (joy!) and led a cast of hundreds to a meadow outside Zurich for a leaping, ululating and face-achingly joyous finale. Actors sleepwalked through careers. "You can't imagine what it was like," says Anupam Kher, star of 290 films in 18 years, who reprises his role as the father from Bend it Like Beckham in Bride and Prejudice. "After the whole fame thing wears off, you begin to wonder, 'Really, what the hell am I doing?'" Even domestic audiences complained, including India's leader. "Why do our films stick to stereotype?" lamented Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee after seeing Devdas, which for all its well-deserved critical praise, was still the 12th version of the same love story since the original 1928 silent movie. By mid-2002, Bollywood was largely a commercial concern - to this day, critics rate films and actors almost entirely by box-office pull - of little interest to anyone outside South Asia, except homesick migrants and the odd film buff.

So what's changed? Everything. Rai's unchallenged position in the industry is partly due to her determined pursuit of "different, against the grain" roles, such as her 1997 part in Tamil director Mani Ratnam's little-seen but acclaimed art-house movie Iruvar. But Rai is not some solitary crusader, rather the most successful disciple of a new mantra of innovation that has swept Indian film in the past year. Because in 2002 Bollywood truly bombed. All but 12 of the year's 132 mainstream Hindi releases flopped, and the $1.3 billion-a-year industry, used to comfortable annual growth of 15%, groaned under unaccustomed losses of some $60 million. The formulas suddenly weren't commercial anymore. And although some moviemakers groped around for new blueprints - horror, skin flicks, anything - a band of urban and Westernized writers, directors, producers and actors, loosely grouped under the banner "New Bollywood," overran the industry. "Overnight, those of us who didn't think the audience was dumb and who were sick of movies being talked about as 'products' were in charge," says producer-of-the-moment Pritish Nandy. "The old generation lost control, and the new generation just walked in."

Today, fresh ground is broken with every release. Out are fluffy romances. In are films such as Jism (Body), Mumbai Matinee and Khwahish (Desire) that have shattered Bollywood's tradition of prudish sex scenes, by making previously taboo kisses routine and by finally ditching the rustling bushes that used to denote what came next. Out are badly dubbed punchups and in are dark stories like the true tale of Bombay's rival crime lords (Company) or India's Hindu-Muslim divide (Mr. and Mrs. Iyer), weird stories like that of a hairdresser who reads minds (Everybody Says I'm Fine) or a retired judge who literally runs off with a young model (Jogger's Park) or dark and weird tales like the one of a failed rock singer who leads his bandmates to murder (Paanch). Urban, middle-class films like Dil Chahta Hai (Do Your Thing) are proving there is money in ignoring India's rural audiences, whose preferences run to the spectacular, the musical and, invariably, the alpine. Some films are even leaving out the songs. (...)

If music is used today, it's for a reason. Bride and Prejudice choreographer Saroj Khan, 55, says that for 600 films she did nothing but "item numbers," dance sequences inserted with little regard for narrative. "Now suddenly I have a story to work with," she says. "You won't believe me, but that's very different. And very nice." (...)

Propelled by this whirlwind of raw creativity, star after star is breaking type and embracing new roles, recharging some long-languishing talents. Like Rai, Bombay legend Amitabh Bachchan is trying something different, raising eyebrows with his portrayal of the stylishly amoral, Bo Derek-obsessed crime kingpin in Boom. (...) And producer Nandy cheerfully expects a torrent of outrage upon release of the gritty Chameli, as megastar Kareena Kapoor dumps her customary chaste refinement to play the streetwalker of the film's title opposite Rahul Bose's banker. The head of 20th Century Fox's Indian arm, Aditya Shastri, describes the industry as suddenly, and fundamentally, transformed. "It takes a very brave or very foolish person to do a traditional song-and-dance movie today," he says. (...)

On the set of Bride and Prejudice, Rai is already coping with some of the pitfalls of the revolution. After every scene, she quietly slips past the longing stares of 100 Indian extras and retreats to her cordoned-off trailer. This past year she has already endured her own "Bennifer" style press attention when she split from fellow movie star Salman Khan only to link up with the star of Company, Vivek Oberoi. The size of her celebrity is measured by the 17,000 unofficial websites in her name and the immediate overloading and crash of her own official site the moment it was launched this spring. (...) Rai seems to have little time even to sleep: she scheduled both her photo shoots with TIME for the middle of the night, saying it was her only free time, before crying off exhausted on the second shoot and finding a spare two hours the following day. But you won't hear Rai complain. (...)

Overwhelmed by the demands on their time or simply by their own importance, lead actors in Bollywood would in the past jeopardize entire productions by double-booking themselves, turning up hours late on set (sometimes not appearing at all) or raising fees midway through a shoot. But bigger names, such as Rai and Bose, are now signing with Western talent agencies (both are with the gilt-edged William Morris Agency) that ensure commitments are honored. (...)

It's all part of a newfound professionalism in Bollywood that is evident both artistically and financially. On the set of Lakshya, at Film City studios outside Bombay, this new regimen is in full effect. Director Farhan Akhtar and producers UTV have fixed a budget of $7 million (large by Bollywood standards), issued contracts to crew and actors, insisted on a finished script, insured the set and laid out a meticulously detailed schedule for months of continuous shooting in Bombay and Ladakh. Such black-and-white commitments may be rudimentary in the West but are almost unprecedented in an industry in which a quiet word or a handshake have long sealed deals and in which films were shot piecemeal over a number of years.

Likewise, the financing of Bollywood movies has become far less murky. In the 1990s, a series of scandals broke about the links between Bombay's movie world and the underworld. Producers were the target of repeated police investigations into how deeply Mob money had penetrated the movies, and top actors who were called to testify often sensationally refused. Indeed, just last month, Devdas producer Bharat ("King of Bollywood") Shah was sentenced to a year in jail (but released due to time served) for concealing the underworld's involvement in his 2000 movie Chori Chori, Chupke Chupke (On the Quiet, Hush Hush). In the past, such attachment to Mob money and the conditions that came with it - flying stars to Dubai, Pakistan or South Africa to indulge gangsters' egos - proved a major deterrent to Western investors. But today, even Bombay's police admit the connection with the underworld is weakening - a transformation that began in October 2000, when India's bureaucrats finally lifted outdated restrictions on Bollywood's access to banks and private investors. As legitimate funds poured in from respectable backers, so a new culture of legal and transparent business practices swept the industry.

New Bollywood is not there yet. Director Nair estimates that it will be "two or three years" before its movies attain what she calls Western-style "craft and rigor," and UTV's founder, Ronnie Screwvala, adds that it will take "three to five years" before Western business practices become standard. In the meantime, maybe the greatest danger of Bollywood's invasion of the West is that the West might invade right back. Director Varma's urbanized zeal for Hollywood (...) carries with it the danger that, in less-skilled hands, Indian film could become little more than exotic imitation. Although he admits to enjoying how well the world received Lagaan and although he welcomes New Bollywood's energy, actor Aamir Khan warns that a wholesale rejection of song and dance might kill the "color, fire and innocence" that defines Indian cinema. (...)

With Rai as India's standard bearer, there is little immediate danger of that. She may position herself as New Bollywood in terms of roles, but in person Rai embodies the Indian middle-class - and very Old Bollywood - ideal: a modern girl with traditional values. For someone emerging as a 21st century film star, there are few people less likely to turn into a Western-style sex kitten. (...) In fact, it is because Rai is such a paragon of age-old, dutiful Indian femininity, says producer Nayar, that she was so right for the headstrong but obedient Elizabeth Bennett character, Lalita. "That's her appeal," says Bride and Prejudice co-star Martin Henderson. "When Hollywood women are so exposed - when you see ass cheeks hanging out on MTV, for God's sake - there's something wonderful about a woman who is sensible and refined, mysterious and sensual."

In an age of terror, perhaps it makes sense for audiences to yearn for a more innocent time. Rai agrees that although New Bollywood may represent a welcome reinvigoration of a tired industry, the reason she is suddenly attracting a global audience is the same reason that Bollywood has always drawn adulation from millions of Indians. "It's the chance to be transported from the toil and the worry," she says, "the chance to feel good about life again".'

BEWITCHED BY BOLLYWOOD, Richard Corliss

'I am that strange, nearly solitary creature: a non-Indian fan of Indian movies.

Indian popular movies, that is. The movies that sing. The movies that show beautiful people suffering glamorously, wrestling with dilemmas of family honor and filial loyalty and, when words can't express the ache or ardor in their hearts, dancing vigorously with a couple of hundred of their best friends. The movies that enthrall, enrage and obsess a billion Indians, on the subcontinent and around the world. The ones that almost no serious film critic west of Suez notices, let alone cherishes.

To critics and film lovers in the West, the phrase "Indian movies" has long had an entirely different meaning: the stately, languorous studies of Satyajit Ray and his art-house progeny. Most film-savvy Westerners don't know, or care, that India also possesses a huge national cinema that rivals Hollywood in quantity and quality.

This was not always the case. In the early 1950s the Cannes Film Festival, then as now the introducer and arbiter of international movie taste, showcased several mainstream Indian films. V. Shantaram's Amar Bhoopali, Bimal Roy's Do Bigha Zamin (a prize-winner), Raj Kapoor's Awaara, the Kapoor-produced Boot Polish (which won a special award for child actress Baby Naaz) - all played on the Cannes screen, announcing that the newly independent India, like post-war Japan, was making movies that deserved the world's respect. But in 1956 Cannes showed Ray's Pather Panchali. From then on, until Devdas played last year, popular Indian musical dramas vanished from Cannes. The "other" Indian cinema was now the one the worldwide film community recognized as "Indian."

That's the one I knew of too - until I saw a retrospective of Mani Ratnam's work at the Toronto Film Festival in 1994. Ratnam, a Tamil who made his movies in Madras, is not exactly Bollywood. But Nayakan (a gloss on The Godfather, retold and musicalized with the vigor of Singin' in the Rain) and Roja (one of the director's early I-love-a-terrorist dramas, boasting A.R. Rahman's first major movie score) were similar in form and style to the Bombay product. They were also, to me, revelations: thrilling proof that someone knew how to make serious films with a racing pulse. For decades a chasm had separated two genres: the churning, air-headed "movie" and the slow, austere, art-house "film." Ratnam reminded me that movie entertainment could also be - should be - film art.

I threw myself into Bollywood-style films, without reservation or condescension. Since they were not to be found even in specialty video stores in New York City, I ventured into Manhattan's Little India. There, the trove opened. The older tapes might be of execrable quality, and the films might not all be subtitled. But they showed me that India's movie splendor stretched back a half-century (the art industry's golden age was the '50s ) and forward, if more haphazardly, to the present.

A movie critic's trade secret: we want you to think we are scholarly types, exegetes of the director's art, but like any passionate moviegoer, we love to fall in love with tender or terrible stories, with exotic locales, and especially with movie stars. Kapoor and Guru Dutt were gifted directors, but they were also charismatic actors: Kapoor, to me, is a swarthier Ronald Colman; Dutt, a softer Johnny Depp. They also had radiant co-stars: slim, intense Nargis for Kapoor and, for Dutt, Waheeda Rehman, so luminous she lights up the murkiest scene. I find Shabana Azmi a glorious and heroic figure - in her films and her public life. I'm in awe of Amitabh Bachchan's stature and Old Testament God voice; then I dissolve in admiring giggles as, in the Jumma Chumma number from Hum, he marches around a saloon carrying a hose that seems to spritz geysers of beer from his loins - a true Bachchan bacchanal. Of the younger stars, Shahrukh Khan still beguiles me with his range, his pout, his dimples. And I'll see almost anything with Tabu or Urmila Matondkar.

I'll probably see them alone. When Devdas was shown at Cannes, I was the only critic still there at the end. But I really don't care if Indian popular cinema attracts other acolytes from among my critical colleagues in the West. I'm happy to be a solitary cultist (...) entranced by the beatitudes of Bollywood'.

CHARACTER BUILDING, Alex Perry

'There's something familiar about the barefoot figure with shoulder-length hair and full beard, wearing tatty jeans and a loose linen shirt, padding across Aamir Khan's minimalist Bombay apartment. Only when he curls his legs onto a chair and waits expectantly for the questions to begin does it become clear that this is not one of Khan's friends but rather the latest incarnation of India's most respected and versatile young actor himself. Gone is Aamir Khan, the hipster in a tight-fitting silk suit, outrageous tie and boyish close-crop whom millions watched stride the red carpet outside a score of premieres. In his place, meet Aamir Khan, Jesus Christ Superstar. In a few weeks, Khan will star opposite Aishwarya Rai (*) as the rebel leader Mangal Pandey in The Rising, Ketan Mehta's $10 million epic about the 1857 Indian mutiny against British rule. But despite Pandey's pivotal place in Indian history, says Khan from beneath his straggly growth, no one knows what he looked like. "So I thought if I grew everything, then the makeup and hair people would have a full palate to make him look however they wanted."

Spending months to prepare for a character might be routine for a method actor in the West. But in Bollywood the idea that any actor would take even a weekend off - let alone four months to read history books and grow a beard - is verging on the revolutionary.

Khan, however, is just that. After a stereotypical start in Indian film - a breakthrough smash-hit song-and-dance romance in 1988 followed by eight forgettable musical extravaganzas in three years - Khan broke ranks and, as he says, "began to swim upstream." He became the first Indian star in memory to pick and choose roles by artistic merit. By carefully mixing commercial hits with experimental releases, Khan built a name as both a bankable star and a credible actor. His simultaneous conquest and transformation of Bollywood was cemented with the 2001 releases of Dil Chahta Hai (Do Your Thing), a groundbreaking portrait of middle-class Bombay, and Lagaan (Land Tax), about Indian villagers struggling against 19th century colonialism - which earned India's third-ever Oscar nomination.

By the time he steps onto Ketan Mehta's set, Khan, now 38, will not have appeared before a movie camera for more than three years. It is a measure of how highly he is regarded that a hiatus that would have snuffed out lesser stars has only bolstered Khan's reputation for Stanley Kubrick-like discernment. "For a star of Aamir's size to have chosen to work the way he did, when he did, created huge waves," says Mehta. "He is responsible for bringing realism, passion and joy back to Indian film."

Although his fame has grown increasingly global, Khan says he has no intention of leaving Bombay's bright lights for more earnest Western environs. He tells a story of taking Lagaan to Los Angeles in 2001 and meeting a Dreamworks executive who liked to watch Bollywood movies with his children and who pleaded with Khan to stay on in Bombay and produce more "wonderful, innocent films." The executive need not have worried, says Khan. "I'm very happy doing Indian films and working with the musical form we have," he says. "When it's done right, it's like opera. It can be truly great." Indeed, the idea of taking part in a film with prospects he judges as anything less, he adds, "is something I just can't do." It's been Khan's personal code for a decade. And, as the rest of Bollywood is finally realizing, it's also a mantra that distinguishes mere movies from art'.

(*) Rani Mukherjee, e non Aishwarya Rai, è stata scritturata per il film.

THE LEADING LADY, Alex Perry

'Aishwarya Rai has been Bollywood's leading lady for years, but now, with a slew of new films due for release across the world, is on the verge of becoming a global superstar. TIME's Alex Perry caught up with the 29-year-old former Miss World on the set of Bride and Prejudice, just north of London.

TIME: How do you choose your roles? You seem to be getting pickier.

Rai: I'm a student. I want to do better, and I want directors who can find the actress in me and be my teachers. I'm interested in the whole process of editing, post-production and direction. With each film, I get more and more involved and it's more and more time-consuming. Also, I like to break myths and people's preconceived ideas. My characters have always stood for something, have always had an opinion, although they've never really rebelled. As for being picky, in the beginning, I did get a bit caught up in the way the industry functions at top speed. I was never fast-paced in the way I work. Initially, I was working on several films at a time, then I would work on a maximum of two to three films a year and by Devdas I had slowed down to two, and now, this is my seventh year, I have slowed down even more. Three years ago I was on a world tour, a promotional tour, with (...) Aamir Khan. I was at my first show with him and I was saying, "Aamir, I really want to work much more selectively." He asked me how long I had been acting and I said "Four years." He said, "It took me six years to get to even vaguely working the way I wanted."

TIME: How do you feel about becoming a world star?

Rai: For me, it's not about breaking big in Hollywood, but having interesting experiences. In July 2002 I met (...) Gurinder Chadha and in October I went to the States - I had just had a very positive experience in Cannes and from the European media - and I went and met with the agencies and it just snowballed. Last summer, I had meetings with Robert de Niro and Roland Joffe and Mike Leigh. They'd say, "When are you available? And I'm like, "Maybe at the end of next year." And they're like, "Wow, you can't be serious." But that's my life right now. I really don't work to a plan, but I just do what interests me and what I like to do. Gurinder had great ethics and goodwill and I like what she had to offer.

TIME: Are you trying to move away from traditional Bollywood song and dance romances? What do you make of the "New Bollywood"? It seems to be generating a lot of interest in the West.

Rai: I am very happy with our cultural backdrop and the backdrop of our cinema and participating in a movement to project our cinema internationally. Cinema is cinema, but for some reason in the world arena, Indian cinema is slotted into its own small category. People are breaking the stereotype and it's good that Indian cinema is being recognized. Now is the time and there are actors like me who are willing to support that change. But it's unfair to say that Indian cinema is "arriving." Indian cinema has been delivering a certain aesthetic to its audience very successfully for years and I can say without any shame that I love song and dance. I'd hate to see that disappear and as an artist I am happiest to put my all into an art form, as you do with song and dance. Maybe the world is just becoming more aware of our culture.

TIME: Why did Bollywood stay in the same rut for so long?

Rai: For a long time, cinema has been the biggest form of entertainment in India. And the larger body of India has such hard lives that when they go to the cinema, they want to be transported, to see a world of hope and color and positivity, the innocent, beautiful fairytale. It's the chance to be transported from the toil and the worry, the chance to feel good about life again. Boy meets girl, a bad guy comes along, but everything is sorted out in the end. It's the innocence of Life is Beautiful. Song and dance sequences create that mood. It's beautiful in its own way. In Bollywood, it's always a happy ending.

TIME: Are you aware that half a billion Indian men think you're the perfect woman?

Rai: Is this an image I'm working hard to live up to? No, I have always just been... I am human. If I was really trying to live up to that perception of me, that would be too much pressure. Then more fame you have, the more input and hard work there is. I have so little time to myself and for my sanity. But no, I'm not acting to an image. I have to get into another character enough in front of the camera. If people think I am just an image, they're wrong. I'm just being the girl I was brought up to be.

TIME: How do you cope with the pressure?

Rai: Is there pressure? Well, there is the sheer pace of my life these days. Premieres, festivals, interviews, press conferences, there is less and less time for yourself. And you do feel it. They only way I'm OK, the only way I keep sane as I have immense faith in God and my friends. But if you do not perceive the pressure, it's not there. It's all about conditioning yourself. And hey, I can always choose to do something else. I just go with the flow and try to recognize the reality of it all. It's really not something I worry about. I only think about it when I'm asked. I'm just too busy. I like my work, and I'm true to it; and apart from that, I'm just being.

TIME: Is that really possible in your position?

Rai: I have to learn to be light on myself. I could be really disappointed and hurt by what is said about me: all this trivial stuff about wardrobes and if I was wearing huge gowns, would it cover up my plaster? [Rai fractured an ankle this year.] But I cannot work myself into a knot and hurt about it. But when I went abroad, it was such a humbling experience, it was a fabulous experience and people were amazing with me. People have been wonderful. The response I have been accorded has been humbling. So I said, "Alright God, I get the message. Go with the flow".'

THE LEGEND, Alex Perry

'Amitabh "The Big B" Bachchan is the undisputed godfather of Bollywood. He has been the face of Indian show business for two decades and is omnipresent on the subcontinent, his black-haired, white-bearded face staring out from billboards, television advertisements and the cinema screen in several films a year. In a BBC poll on the eve of this century, viewers across the world voted him the "star of the millennium." He spoke to TIME's Alex Perry on the set of Lakshya (Target), directed by Farhan Akhtar, co-starring Hrithik Roshan and Preity Zinta and due for release next year.

TIME: Tell me about Boom.

Bachchan: [Director] Kaizad Gustad is quite crazy and he has weird ideas and Boom is one such idea. It's a crazy film by a crazy guy. It's almost a satire, a black comedy. I just had the desire to do something different, and with people who were making different kinds of films.

TIME: Why is Bollywood getting so much attention outside India now?

Bachchan: I've always believed in our content and our talent. I feel that particularly because of language, we are handicapped in getting a large world audience. But Hindi cinema has the same ingredients that appeal to the whole world. And now that is happening, the West is becoming aware of what is happening here. There's a lot of interest and that's good for India. But it's odd because I've always believed that, believed in that ability for cinema to communicate across the globe. At the moment our films have a novelty value for the outside world. And the song and dance and fantasy or escapist element in them, which has been criticized before, is now becoming quite attractive. There have been suggestions that we should minimize the song and dance. But I feel that it's our raison d'être and we're not going to change that. Besides, no matter how escapist we have been, we've never digressed from the basic ethos of the country, which is the relations between and within families, festivals and the triumph of good over evil. These themes come directly from our mythology and are so ingrained in all Indians that we expect to see some sort of visual representation of the fundamentals of those stories on the screen. Our films embody a lot of tradition, a lot of culture, the great visuals of color, the exuberance of it and of the music, which is integral to our existence. Indian films are like our food or our sense of dress or our languages: there's a great variety and it changes every 100 miles, but there is something in common, a national Indian essence, that binds them all together.

TIME: But Bollywood is changing, isn't it?

Bachchan: A lot of the changes are maybe down to the advent of television. Five or six years ago, we had one channel, now there's 90. And TV has eased the viewer into seeing better quality stuff. There's a lot of movie channels showing better stuff out of Hollywood. People are fed up with seeing the same thing over and over. They want a qualitative change. Also, in the past, we always underplayed, undersold ourselves. We told ourselves, 'Don't step out of India or you'll get hit in the head.' And that's all changing now because of this sudden interest in India. And we're changing the way we work. We're following the principles of synchronized sound, the production qualities of artists. The amount of detail in this film, and the effort being taken in getting the detail right, is quite remarkable. In funding, and money, generally this side of the business is so disorganized and vague. You never know where your film is running, you never know what the returns are, there's rampant piracy, almost on the same day of the release, and it's so frustrating after all your blood, sweat and tears. So I tell you, on this film, it's a joy to be working like this; to finish a project in a set number of days and have everything on schedule and truly professional, to end the disorganization that has ruled for so long, it's an absolute delight.

TIME: What about your own career? Are you taking on new roles?

Bachchan: I used to play leading roles. But I'm 61 now, and losing that identity and I really do not have to bother now whether I'm going to be playing a negative role or a positive role. And a lot of actors are doing the same now, doing braver and more adventurous parts and not confining themselves to a particular image.

TIME: What do you make of the accusations of plagiarism. Particularly of Hollywood hits, often leveled against Bollywood?

Bachchan: Hollywood itself takes from British and Japanese cinema. I've even done a film where the story was transferred back to Hollywood. The truth is that it's very difficult to escape accusations of plagiarism when we're all naturally influenced by what goes on elsewhere. And look at it this way - our government comes from the West, as does cricket. How do we cut off this influence in film? 

TIME: What about the influence of gangsters?

Bachchan: This phenomenon is there even in Hollywood, but it's very rare. We check where the money is coming from. In fact, my Amitabh Bachchan Corp. [ABC] was the first attempt to corporatize and organize the industry. We were ahead of our time and tried to do too much too young and had a huge vision, and I had creditors on my back. But now there's 15 companies doing the same thing, following our vision to have everything down under one umbrella, and big financial institutions are getting involved. You have to remember that 50 years ago in India, children from good homes were not allowed to go and see movies. It was looked down upon. So it's quite a journey to have the industry becoming respectable financially and for the world to be taking an interest.

TIME: Your decision not to let ABC go bankrupt - that sent a pretty powerful signal to the industry, no? That there was financial respectability in Bollywood.

Bachchan: I chose to pay everyone back and I worked personally to do so, to make sure we paid back that amount, some $1.5 million. My conscience wouldn't have allowed me to do anything else and that's where a lot of my desire to keep working, and doing so much work, came from. I wasn't trying to set an example to the industry, it was purely a very personal thing, but if it did send some sort of message about responsibility, then that's a good thing.

TIME: Getting back to Lakshya, what excites you about this film?

Bachchan: Our films have invariably shown Indian soldiers fighting Pakistan and but they have not allowed us to see the enemy or even be specific about who they were fighting. With this, all that's changing and we've been given permission to call a spade a spade. It's based on real-life events in Kargil in 1999 and we've been on location in Ladakh to actually recreate on sites moments that actually happened in real life. I guess it's patriotic - in the end India won - but it has a humane side to it.

TIME: What's the future for Indian film?

Bachchan: I see a lot of optimism and I see that we're going through one of our most exciting phases. And what so wonderful is that the world, and particularly the English, are becoming so receptive to India. It's really incredible. And as a result there's a new level of maturity and confidence in Indian cinema. And that's wonderful to see too'.

THE NEW WAVE, Alex Perry

'Rahul Bose, 36, is the new face of Bollywood. A former advertising account manager who switched to acting at 26, Bose has emerged as the frontman for everything experimental, new and different in Indian cinema with a string of alternative hits to his name. Next year, he will star opposite Glenn Close in Merchant-Ivory's Heights, before moving on to produce and direct an all-American cast in his follow-up to Everybody Says I'm Fine, which this year became the first Indian movie ever to be released in American theatres (*). Bose met TIME's Alex Perry in Bombay.

TIME: Why is Bollywood suddenly breaking with formula?

Bose: Well, is it? I don't see anyone interested in totally breaking the mold. The style is changing, the dressing up is changing, but a lot of what is coming out is still formulaic. Maybe it's just different from the Bollywood formula of song and dance. The point is that we don't have to break it. Just freshen it up. Sometimes when you are successful, people think you've broken the mold.

TIME: OK. Let me put it this way. There's a new energy and new confidence in Bollywood and a new interest from outside India.

Bose: You're right. There's a sea change. Four years ago, no one in Hollywood had even heard of Indian film. After Everybody Says I'm Fine, I was suddenly called by three producers. That's unheard of. I think the world is getting smaller, we are getting more and more recognition and there is a certain sense that people in Bombay are beginning to feel of, 'We're no less than others, our film Lagaan got nominated for an Oscar, we can do good stuff.' And there will be some extremely bad films made out of all this, but a couple of good ones as well. Also, there has been a diktat put out by the bosses of American studios to fund movies in other countries that would seem to have audiences across the world. 'Find movies that will break through.' And that's new in the last two years. It's cheaper, you see. We can make a movie here for $1 million that would cost $20 million in the US. And the money's talking. So here, it all adds up to movement. I was thinking about moving abroad to work a few years ago. But now, everything's suddenly changed. There's a huge upswing and suddenly Indian talent is keeping up with others in Los Angeles or Spain or Italy. And, back here, the guard is changing. I have very respected old-style Bollywood guys phoning me up and saying, 'I want to make crossover films, or low budget films or experimental films. I'm sick of doing this old s---.' Put us all together, and you have a movement. Put us together with the audience, and you have something sweeping the world.

TIME: What about Bollywood's problem with plagiarism?

Bose: Everybody plagiarizes. The only difference here is that no one pays for remake rights. It is illegal and corrupt. But then, this is India, not Singapore. I met Quentin Tarantino and he'd heard about Kaante, which borrowed a lot from Reservoir Dogs. And he was so thrilled. He said, "I ripped that off from Hong Kong and now you guys have taken it from me." Imitation is a form of flattery, you see.

TIME: What problems do you see?

Bose: Could we please have less films about identity? You know, 'Oh my God, I am dislocated, am I American or am I Indian?' F-- off, you know? Let's work up some original stories.

TIME: And who's going to conquer the world?

Bose: The first actors to cross over will be women. Aishwarya Rai could be Moroccan, Spanish, Italian, Thai, Lebanese. The conquering of America hasn't happened yet, but it's going to happen soon. People are seeing more and more Indians in their everyday lives over there. Now if someone just has the tenacity, they'll cast Shah Rukh Khan opposite Tom Cruise: both these guys have audience of a billion and a half, and put them together, you've got half the world. Or imagine Aamir Khan instead of Matthew Perry: it would melt the race barrier. And in the meantime, people like me can start getting meaty roles in American art-house movies. Ha ha'.

(*) Non ho visto Heights, ma in rete non trovo traccia della partecipazione di Bose al film. Quanto al progetto da regista con cast americano, non è stato realizzato.

THE TRAILBLAZER, Alex Perry

'At a time when much of Bollywood finds itself questioning its direction, Ram Gopal Varma has proved to be an answer. The fiery 42-year-old director scored critical praise and back to back hits with last year's gritty gangster movie Company and this summer's horror smash Bhoot (Ghost), which so scared its audience that one man had a heart attack while another is suing Varma for "mental torture." Next March Varma is due to start shooting Ek (One) which, starring a roll call of Bollywood's biggest names and costing $20 million, is the most expensive and perhaps most eagerly anticipated Indian film of all time (*). As a producer, he has only increased his reputation for innovation. He released five films from his stable of 10 directors this year, including the well-received Darna Mana Hai (You Can't be Scared), a collection of six short stories, and Main Madhuri Dixit Banna Chahti Hoon (I Want to be Madhuri Dixit). New Bollywood's director and producer of the moment spoke to TIME's Alex Perry in Bombay.

TIME: What's happening to Bollywood?

Varma: Bollywood is going through a generation change. For the last 15 years, song and dance romances and family dramas ruled and Bollywood became trapped into thinking that without songs, a film couldn't work, or even that films were just something to package around the songs. Music companies were even interfering with how they wanted the movie to go. Now there's a new set of filmmakers in town. I grew up with Western films and I always wondered why Bollywood never made films like that. Why do we always have to break into song? It doesn't make sense to a Western audience and I'm 42 years old, I live in this country and I've still not got used to it. With films like Bhoot, which was a huge hit but had no songs, we're breaking that forever.

TIME: Have you had to fight to make the films you wanted?

Varma: The resistance was there, and I've tried to convert people.

At this point, Varma's mobile telephone rings. He checks the number and announces the caller is a film distributor in Dubai and indicates TIME should listen in.

Varma [to distributor]: There's no music in the film, only background music. You won't really hear it... It's a student picture, correct... There's maybe three or four songs in the background but you won't really hear them...

Varma [grinning, hand over phone, to TIME]: "No songs! No songs!" He's having a heart attack.

Varma [to distributor]: Don't worry about it, OK? You're just buying it and selling it, right? ...

Varma [aside to TIME]: I'm in that position now, you know? "F--- you! Take it or get out!"

After a few pleasantries, Varma hangs up.

TIME: What's the future for Bollywood?

Varma: There's going to be a massive change. A lot of old filmmakers are going to go out of business. Anyone who looks at a film as a formula of one song, two comedy scenes and three action scenes, who doesn't look at the totality of the film, is lost now. Anyone who follows the old prudish traditions, of showing a bush's shaking leaves when they mean people are f---ing behind a tree, is gone. And anyone who doesn't follow the West is gone. For many people in the business, their pride won't let them. But following the West is not surrendering. Following the West, the best of the West, is following originality. Western innovation is superior, and I think we're just beginning to understand that. With my films, I'm targeting the urban multiplexes, the sophisticated media-savvy young crowd. Frankly, I couldn't give a f--- for the villages'.

(*) Ignoro quale sia il film citato.

THE YOUNG TURK, Alex Perry

'Aamir Khan is Bollywood's most respected young actor, and set the standard for an industry when he became the first actor in a generation to pick and choose his roles, to insist on only taking on one role at a time, and devote time and energy to preparing for them. In 2001, Lagaan, in which starred and which he produced, was nominated for an Oscar. The 38-year-old returns next opposite Aishwarya Rai in The Rising, the story of the 1857 Indian mutiny against British colonial rule. He spoke with TIME's Alex Perry at his apartment in Bombay where he was preparing for his new role.

TIME: What's happening to Bollywood?

Khan: Things are changing really quickly. There is a distinctly alternative path that Indian cinema has been taking over the last 12 to 15 years, but we are really seeing this manifest itself more obviously now. When I began, there was a lot of resistance to new ways of thinking; now there is a lot less. In the 1950s and 1960s, Indian cinema was making really good stuff, but in the late 1960s and 1970s there was a gradual decline and the late 1970s and 1980s, things could hardly have been worse. Finally, in the late 1980s, some better films started being made again, using music, but using it with some sensibility. A bunch of people got into film who were completely fed up with the sort of films coming out. It was like, 'F--- you. We can't stomach this any longer.' Plus the audience is changing and getting exposed to more and more different times of entertainment. In fact, it's quick stunning how quickly people have changed: we've gone from one television to 100 - not a natural growth - and people have been bombarded with a whole host of new things from outside India. Anyway, so now people are building on the good work that was being done then, and doing completely different stuff. People are suddenly willing to experiment with new ideas: the films being made today wouldn't have even seen a release 10 to 15 years ago. There's a whole new level of passion and integrity and commitment. We have a lot to learn as a film industry, but the momentum is building now.

TIME: Do you feel you want to move on from Bollywood?

Khan: No. I feel very protective and close to our cinema and I'm very much a part of it. I'm very happy doing Indian films and working with the musical form we have. Of course, Bollywood can be quite ghastly, but at its best, it's a wonderful form. There's a level of passion and excitement and a heightening of emotions which can be momentous. It'd be awful to lose it. Music and singing and dancing are also part of our culture and our aural tradition. We don't write anything down in our history. But Bollywood is not something I look down on. When people say, 'Indian films are Bollywood musicals,' I think that's great. When it's done right, it's like opera. It can be truly great. When it's done badly, it's not good, but then nothing is. In Lagaan, when the first song happens, the clouds are coming and the villagers think it's going to rain. Imagine that without a song, it could easily be done, but with the song it completely enhances the moment, it makes you feel more, it sucks you into the story.

TIME: But some times the songs are ridiculous. You know, all this running off to the Swiss Alps in the middle of the narrative.

Khan: There are these films, stories that do not make any sense, suddenly you're in the Swiss Alps with 40 dancers behind you. No, I don't like that. I used to be really upset at the kind of films coming out of India. I couldn't watch this crap. But on the other hand, I do strongly feel that we have a lot of talent here, and a huge potential to entertain the world, and I feel we should do it in our own way. I don't think we should tailor ourselves. We should retain our own style of story-telling. A second point is that, it's a very positive approach to story-telling. There is a lot of hope in it, not much cynicism, and that's what cinema is for me. Life is Beautiful is a film that moves you: it's larger than life, saying things with a broad sweep and hitting the high notes of emotion. So I'm quite happy doing films for an Indian audience. What excites me and what is changing is that we can now entertain a world audience. And we should explore that, but we shouldn't neglect our audience here. There are filmmakers who are looking towards a Western audience. But I'm not interested in making a Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon or looking for a pattern of what might be successful. I want to make films that I believe in and if that happens to interest an international audience, then great. Lagaan is an example of a mainstream Indian film that was seen all over the world and that was never intended for an international audience.

TIME: Has is been difficult to choose the kind of films you wanted?

Khan: The first film I made, nobody wanted to buy it. At that time the star system was very rigid and really crude action movies were all around. And this was a love story, not crude at all, very subtle and the girl and boy die at the end. The marketers viewed it with a lot of suspicion, they thought it was a hell of a bummer and wouldn't release it. And then when it did come out, it was a breath of fresh air. It went through the roof, people came to the theaters in droves. So it's been an exciting journey, but I have been swimming upstream and trying to do my own kind of stuff. I am not trying to make any great change, but I want to do what I want to do, for Christ's sake. And now, I feel less and less need to do commercial work.

TIME: That's not always been the case, though, right?

Khan: When I first came in, actors were doing 30 to 40 films a year. Within six months of my first film, I'd signed for eight more. And I couldn't manage. When I started work, I realized it was absurd: I had to work 16 hours a day for three or four years, shooting on two sets a day. And then these eight films started releasing and they all started bombing: they were horrible films. But it was a learning experience, and after I finished these films, I began to choose. And ever since, I've been working towards establishing a way of working that I'm comfortable with. And it's taken quite a time to achieve that. Actually, I've been extremely stubborn. I've said 'No' to a lot of very, very good directors. But I think if I hadn't, I wouldn't have survived. You see, I need to feel I like doing it to do it well. And I need to have an audience in Bihar (...), I need a guy there to feel like he loves me.

TIME: Were you always confident of your choices?

Khan: No, I was a scared as hell. The press was writing me off as a one-film wonder. And people were saying, 'Has he gone mad? He's not taking on any work.' But my fear and insecurity... I did not allow them to make me take decisions to play safe. I took risks, because I just could not bring myself to do certain films and work a certain way. Shooting two films in a day is just ridiculous. So when I produced my own film, Lagaan, I said, 'I've always wanted one single shooting schedule and let's please have synchronized sound'. And now The Rising is coming too: that's a continuous 22-week shoot.

TIME: How big a problem is mob money in Bollywood?

Khan: What we must realize is that the underworld is very much part of society and it's very much in India. You can't expect it not to impact every walk of life. So, yes, there is that involvement, but it's not to any degree that's unusual. People in the film industry haven't come from Jupiter and Mars, we're all part of the same society, and my level of integrity is the same as other people's, the same as my instinct for survival is the same as others'. And let's face it, the film industry is something that's quite attractive to people and certainly people who are interested in power. There areas where the underworld does exist and should not are administration and law and the police and political life. But people in these areas focus on us to deflect attention. And it angers me because the press falls for it.

TIME: Is Bollywood becoming more professional?

Khan: Things are getting more organized. In the 1950s, films would take nine years to make. I just don't know how they did that. But what's not good is if it goes too far and everything is calculated and measured, as you cannot be creative. Big business can spoil entertainment.

TIME: Why did you choose The Rising?

Khan: I like the concept of a company taking over a whole country and ruling it for 100 years, and the relations between power, money, drugs and weapons. And the sub-plots are really exciting, the relationship between the two cultures.

TIME: What about your co-star, Aishwarya Rai?

Khan: When I was offered the film, nobody else was cast. But I think she has a lot of potential as an actress and a star. She's extremely popular here and has the potential of winning over an audience outside India. She's talented and extremely good looking, and bigger than Julia Roberts in terms of fans.

TIME: What about the new Western interest in Bollywood?

Khan: It's happening very fast. After Lagaan, at the Oscars, I had 30 scripts thrown at me. And there's a lot of productions coming and shooting here. But it's unlikely that all 1,000 Bollywood films that get made in a year are going to get a world release. But people have heard of Bollywood now and they are getting a taste for it and I expect there will be a huge audience for Indian film for a while and then it will slow down, but there will be a certain audience that sticks with it. Indian cinema can be very addictive, it sucks you in. Some of it is ridiculous, but you can't help but watch it. One thing I'm worried about is that a lot of talent might be absorbed into Western film-making. That's not something I am looking forward to'.