Cool Bollywood

South superstar Vikram was more than apprehensive playing the role of Aishwarya Rai’s husband in the Hindi version of Mani Ratnam’s Raavan. Firstly, he wasn’t very comfortable with the language. Secondly, he was already playing the eponymous villain in the Tamil version of the same film. Playing the opposite role in the Hindi version was certainly a challenge.

But he was inspired by Aishwarya Rai who acts in both the Hindi and Tamil version. “Initially, I was very scared because I had this mental block (about Hindi). What kept me going was that Ash didn’t know Tamil and she was doing so well,” Vikram said in an interview.

On top of it, everyone in the crew made Vikram comfortable. “Had I been only doing the Hindi version, I would have been really worried. But it is also in Tamil and everyone made me feel quite comfortable,” the 44-year-old actor added.

With Raavan, Vikram has become the first Indian actor, perhaps the first in the world, to play two opposing roles in the same film in two languages. Abhishek Bachchan was also given a similar offer, but he back out of the Tamil version because he wasn’t comfortable with the language.

The music of Mani Ratnam’s upcoming film Raavan was unveiled in Mumbai on Saturday night and the attention grabbers of the evening were the film’s stars Aishwarya Rai, Abhishek Bachchan, Vikram, music director A R Rahman, director Mani Ratnam and lyricist Gulzar.

While Abhishek and Rahman lit up the evening with energetic performances, Aishwarya Rai hosted the event. Dressed in a fetching cream-coloured saree with red embroidery, she looked every bit enchanting and shared many things about the movie, her role and the conditions in which the film was shot.

She revealed that Ratnam first gave her the idea about ‘Raavan’ in the days when she shot for Guru with him. “For the song ‘Nanna re’ (in Guru), I was dancing in full abundance in the rain. Little did I know that Mani was in the process of making a decision that I will be his new character Ragini for ‘Raavan’,” she said.

The actress aid that her role in the film is the most challenging of her career. “This is the most challenging role of my career,” she said. Describing the condition in which the film was shot, she added: “We shot with snakes, rabbits, leeches moving around us. This has been the best adventure experience.” Abhishek, in a jovial mood as usual, said Mani has pampered him. “As an actor, Mani helps me to behave badly and get away with it,” he said.

Bollywood star Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachan will play the lead role in multi-million film “Tansen”.

Rumour has it that Aishwarya Rai will be seen acting with her ex-boyfriend Vivek Oberoi once again in this film.

After Kyun Ho Gaya Na, both of them will be seen together after a long gap. This impossible task might be done by Satish Kaushik for his new film “Tansen”. So if Aish and Abhishek are paired opposite each other, what role is offered to Vivek?

The film’s plot seems to be interesting or at least for its star cast it will be controversial. The film’s shooting is set to begin in the middle of June preferably in a foreign location.

Aishwarya Rai has three very different films coming up this year, but director Vipul Shah says his film “Action Replay” will bring to the audiences her first full-fledged comedy. “Of course comedy, which is the hardest genre to do, is not taken seriously at the awards. But in my film, Aishwarya has done comedy for the first time.

She may have attempted it here and there earlier. But this is her first full-fledged comedy role. But she’s welcome to get the awards for her other two releases…I don’t mind,” Shah told IANS.

Mani Ratnam’s “Raavan” and Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s “Guzaarish” are the other two films she will be doing this year. While Bhansali’s “Guzaarish” is set to release.

In November, “Raavan” and “Action Replay”, which also stars Akshay Kumar, are due to hit the theatres in quick succession within a month. While “Raavan” is slated for a June 18 release, Shah is all set to release his film in July, arguing that the two films are completely different in mood, theme and treatment. But the filmmaker had a bitter experience last year when his Salman Khan-starrer “London Dreams” released a month after the actor’s home production “Main Aur Mrs.Khanna”. Now apparently Shah plans to sit down with Mani Ratnam and figure out a release strategy whereby neither film suffers.

He said: “‘Raavan’ and ‘Action Replay’ are very different films. And I thought I’d release (mine) in July. But I think I’ll now discuss it with Aishwarya and Mani Ratnam. We need to work as one big family in this industry. “Besides, I still have a song to shoot whereas ‘Raavan’ is complete.

I’ve yet to figure out when I can shoot it because both Aishwarya and Akshay are constantly travelling. We were supposed to shoot it earlier this year in the snow in Manali. Now we may go higher up at the Rohtang Pass or change the location for the song completely,” the director added.

Poor Aishwarya Rai Bachchan! It seems like the actress has been as unlucky as fellow Bollywood beauty Katrina Kaif lately! After falling ill.

On the set of “Action Replay,” Ash cut herself while shooting her new movie, “Raavana.” When Ash, one of B-town’s biggest stars, fell ill while shooting “Action Replay” with Akshay Kumar, Bollywood was on high alert!

The model and actress had spent a week on Manori Island working with Vipul Shah on the movie that tells the story of a time-traveling man, played by Akshay.

But all of a sudden, while shooting a scene, Ash got sick and had to take antibiotics. But it seems like Mrs Bachchan ate the medicine like candy and soon had a bad reaction. Her lips got swollen and her fever worsened.

But what to do when you have to finish a movie? Well, Ash is a true professional and decided to simply cover her face with a veil and continue shooting! Interesting! No rest for this L’Oreal girl!