Young fame-seekers audition for a reality show about flirting,hoping to grab a passport to showbiz Almost none of them,however,is interested in wooing a girl it is fame that they are all chasing. Dressed like the 90s rap artist MC Hammer,in dhoti pants and a jacket,Sunny Arora waits outside the screening room. A Haryana boy,he moved to Mumbai four years ago to realise his dream to be famous. He says he isnt unrealistic like millions of others who want to make it big in films. He wants to be a TV star. The 24-year-old has already done cameos in CID and Adalat on Sony and was even a prospective bridegroom on Veena Ka Swayamvar,but the channel,Imagine,shut down before the show could take off. Shalini Sethi,director-programming,Bindass,admits that of the three cities they scoured for talent Chandigarh and Delhi being the other two Mumbai sees a majority of contestants who aspire to be famous. That these contestants are indiscriminate about the show format does not bother her. The show has introduced the Superstud Oath in Delhi where boys are made to pledge that they will not objectify women. Few of the contestants practise it in real life. While Chouhan brags about having four girlfriends each for a different mood Paras Saluja,a successful entrepreneur in the North but a struggling actor in Mumbai,believes his day is incomplete until he has interacted with a woman in some way. Karan Kullar is open about dating but wants his parents to find him the right girl when it is time for him to marry. Another aspiring superstud Jayesh Lakhotia,an MBA-turned-struggling actor,is wary of women. But the judges at the audition Patel,British-Asian model Sofia Hayat and television actor Madhura Naik say that it is easy to weed out non-serious contestants in the second and final rounds. Were looking for a sense of humour and charm, says Hayat,who found the Sikh boys from Chandigarh to be the most romantic and endearing. In this air of uncertainty and competition,the boys manage to forge bonds. Well find girls anyway,but good friends dont come easy, says Kullar nodding in the direction of Chouhan and Lakhotia. Yet,these aspirants of fame rarely lose sight of their ultimate goal. They are just one-minute friends, says Abhinay Podhiyal,who claims to have snubbed fellow contestants friendly overtures. A student of Mumbais St Xaviers College,he believes that he has it in him to win the show. Then Ill have a bike,bungalow,Aston Martin,fame,everything, he says. Will winning Superdude get him an Aston Martin? Itll be a start, he replies.
