Showbuzz

Friends forever

Caught up with pretty Amisha Patel and goofy Aftab Shivdasani at the Royal Palms Golf Club, faraway in Goregaon the other evening. The two youngsters have been paired together by Vimal Kumar for his next film, Suno Sasurji, a romantic comedy. Friends since childhood, Amisha revealed that she has known Aftab’s sister Afsana from their school days. The two girls even attended the same dance classes, we were told. Aftab, on the other hand, she was introduced to at the CCI Club, which was the actor’s favourite hangout, until Mast made him famous. Today, they seem very much at ease even as they perform some too-close-for-comfort lovey-dovey scenes. "It helps that I know him so well," Amisha grinned. Aftab simply blushed a deep shade or red.

All work and no play…

Nothing comes before work, for Aamir Khan. The perfectionist actor who has now turned producer with Lagaan, has been working day in and day out on the sets of his film in Bhuj. The actor, we hear, will shoot all through his birthday on Tuesday. No respite. But it isn’t like he’s complaining either. "You have to be ready to give up everything when you turn filmmaker," the actor had said, days before he took off for the marathon shooting schedule of Lagaan in January. His wife Reena, who’s been pitching in a hand on production, will fly in and out of Bhuj, while his little kids Junaid and Aaira attend school regularly. Since it’s no point sending him flowers at his Bandra residence, we’ll just take this opportunity to wish him a really happy birthday.

Growing friendship

There’s no way to corroborate these rumours, but too many people have been saying there’s something brewing between Tabu and Milind Soman. The two just finished work on a movie together, and, apparently, they get along famously. In fact, Milind recently dropped in on the sets of Tabu’s new movie to chat her up. Not surprisingly, Tabu chided all photographers who clicked pictures of the two while they spoke animatedly. Wassup guys? Let us in on the little secret, yaar!

Cat among the pigeons

About time Juhi Chawla decided to take on work that would showcase her latent talent… After the debacle of Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani, the chirpy actress has committed to star in a strong woman-oriented film to be directed by Tanuja Chandra. It’s a mother-daughter story revolving around Nafisa Ali and Juhi Chawla. The only cat among the pigeons seems to be Arjun Rampal. A bit young to be cast opposite Juhi, don’t you think?

Reason to celebrate

After taking a short break from those typical maara-maari roles, Sunil Shetty is going back to doing what he’s best at. In his forthcoming film, Krodh, the actor flexes his muscles and beats the living daylights out of a bunch of baddies. When he isn’t doing that, he’s busy romancing raunchy Rambha in picturesque locales. On the personal front, the going seems good for the actor who has been snapped up for a bunch of prestigious films with for banners. There’s also his children’s album which we hear is doing better than was ever expected. So if he’s smiling broadly, let him. He has reason to celebrate.

Ad Mad!

The gossip mills were rife with rumours that Karisma Kapoor was seething mad at Sony TV for using her photograph in an advertising campaign for their new channel, MAX. And although the actress herself was unavailable for comment, a spokesperson for Karisma insisted that none of this was true. The channel too, insists that they have received no legal notice from the star. Explaining why they used pictures of Aishwarya Rai, Govinda and Karisma Kapoor alongwith cricket stars for three of their advertising campaigns, the Vice President of MAX explained that "we conducted a quick survey to find out who were the most popular idols among current-day movie stars, and these were the names thrown up." Incidentally, before the campaigns were released, the company’s CEO Kunal Dasgupta personally wrote to all three actors informing them of the forthcoming campaigns. "Yes it is the first time that campaigns like this are being used in India, so we were a little edgy, but everything’s worked out fine," we were told. For ourown part, we don’t know what all the fuss is about. And in any case, we think the ad featuring Aishwarya Rai and Brian Lara is easily a lot smarter than the one with Karisma.

Sets appeal

If Yash Chopra and company take pride in the fact that they’ve always had the most glorious looking sets, then they have competition in the form of Ajay Devgan who seems to have gone a step ahead by creating a smashing township in Ooty at the hands of Nitin Desai. The set, recently witnessed a 75-day non-stop shoot for Devgan’s next film, Raju Chacha, which stars Kajol and Rishi Kapoor alongwith the action hero himself. Major portions of the movie were also canned in Austria. Now what’s the connection between good ol’ Ooty and far away Austria? Guess we’ll just have to watch the film to know that, huh?