Ranbir gets Rs 7 crores for a film

Raj Santoshi is a very happy man.

Belying all rumours of a fall-out with Ajay Devgan Raj Santoshi is all set to make another film with his favourite actor.

“We’re just about to zero- in on the subject. It’s a contemporary film, not the two period films on Emperor Ashok and the Ramayan that we were planning to do together. Those are on hold right now.

For now Ajay and I getting ready for another film, though I’ll definitely make Ramayan and Ashok with him. But we haven’t fallen out just because a couple of our films together haven’t clicked. That’s not how we work.”

For now Raj is on another trip. “I’m finally starting Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani with Ranbir and Katrina from tomorrow (Wednesday).

It’s my first love story, though people seem to think it’s an intense love story. Which it is not. It has lots of very light very humorous moments. I haven’t worked with Ranbir and Katrina before. So I’m really looking forward to that.”

Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani is to be shot in Mumbai (from tom) then Goa and finally Italy.

“A lot of elements in Ranbir’s character will remind people of his grandfather Raj Kapoor. I’ve worked with Ranbir’s father in Damini.

When I saw the boy in Saawariya I wanted to work with him immediately. Katrina and I were supposed to do a film that had Shahid in it. That didn’t work out. This is a totally different subject.”

Ask the director about Ranbir’s reported remuneration of Rs 7 crores, and Raj shrugs. “That’s between Ranbir and the producers Tips.”

Oh one more thing. Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani also stars Upen Patel.

“It’s a pivotal role. Upen expressed a desire to work with me. We met up. When I narrated the subject he fell in love with it. I’m working with an entirely new team including music composer Pritam.”

Revealed: How Vidya Balan and Shahid’s affair started

Post his break up with Bebo, Shahid is hitting the headlines yet once again. Thanks to his latest affair with Vidya Balan! Everyone is talking about it, but no one knows how it all started.

Contrary to many believes that it was Shahid who was on a rebound and found solace in Vidya’s arms, it was Vidya who took initiative and got something flowing between them.

It was on the sets of Kismat Konnection in Canada. They had never met each other or interacted before. Upon that, they were supposed to shoot an extra intimate romantic scene.

Needless to say, both were nervous and not at ease at all.

A birdie from the sets reveals, “Shahid is an introvert and takes time to open up to people. The unit was worried because Vidya and Shahid had never met each other before. Worst it was the first day of the shoot and the scene to be shot was a romantic one.”

But then our Vidya is one hell of a girl. She decided that enough is enough and she is going to break the ice between the both.

“Vidya just walked up to Shahid. “Autograph please, ” she said placing an autograph book before him. The move took Shahid by complete surprise and he broke into laughter.

The scenario changed completely. The atmosphere suddenly seemed warm and friendly. And what’s more the romantic scene was okayed in just one take, ” the source adds.

Vidya confirmed the incident saying, “Shahid and I had not known each other. He stood aloof and so did I. I decided to break the ice and begged for his autograph. An embarrassed Shahid did not know where to look. We have turned good friends since then.”

Just good friends! We wonder if everyone is lying about them!

Shahid and Priyanka’s first movie together: KAMINE

Well the title for Shahid’s upcoming flick is really strange. As reported earlier Vishal Bhardwaj has signed Shahid Kapoor for his next movie and Shahid will have double role in Kamine.

A source said, “Shahid will have two interesting roles in the film. It is also believed that Priyanka Chopra has been signed as the leading leady for this film”. This is for the first time that Shahid and Priyanka Chopra will be paired opposite each other.”

Vishal Bharadwaj had earlier worker with Shahid Kapoor’s father Pankaj Kapoor in Maqbool and Blue Umbrella. Vishal is hoping that Shahid Kapoor matches the success of his father in Kamine.

I wonder why the film is called Kamine, it would have been better to call it Kutte Kamine since there is a double role in the movie.

I was not flirting with Shahid: Jiah

Jiah Khan has shot for two days for Ken Ghosh. And now she hears from the press that she’s out of the film!

Bollywood plays strange games with those who aren’t familiar with it.

Take Jiah Khan. She made a spectacular debut with an author-backed role in Ram Gopal Varma’s Nishabd.

After that…nothing! Until Aamir Khan green-lighted her for a role in Ghajini.

Then suddenly everything started to fall in place. …Or so it seemed. Until strange stories about Jiah’s conduct have surfaced.

Apparently she was shown the door in Ken Ghosh’s new film with Shahid Kapoor. There was just one small problem.

Jiah wsn’t informed about it.

She appears shocked by tales of her ouster. “I’ve already shot for two days for the untitled film with Shahid. After that there were scheduling issues.

My dates for Ken’s film were clashing with Aamir and Ghajini. I couldn’t possibly let the Aamir project suffer at any cost. It’s my chance to create the impact that I couldn’t, for some weird reasons, create after Nishabd.”

Now Jiah is in fact all set to shoot for Ken’s film. “I’ve already given my dates for Ken’s shooting. No one has so far informed me that I’m not in the film. So it’d be right for me to presume the project remains as it is.”

As for talk of her over-friendly messages to Shahid Jiah protests, “I’ve just sent him a couple of formal messages saying how much I’m looking forward to working with him. Is that wrong?” she asks with touching tenativeness.

She then whispers. “I’m new to all this. I keep to myself and I’ve no idea what people do in this industry. I am here only to work.”

Jiah will have learn the hard way that PR skills are as important as professionalism.

In the meanwhile director Ken Ghosh suddenly surfaced to say Jiah was back in the project. “I wouldn’t like to say much on the matter.I’ll let my producers UTV clear all the misunderstanding.

But Jiah is very much in the project…This isn’t to say that I don’t want to work with Katrina. Of course I do. Look how hot she’s at the boxoffice! We’ll work together some other time. It’s a small industry.”

But how could Katrina be eligible for a role earmarked for Jiah??!!

“Why not?” Ken shoots back. ‘Didn’t Mr Bachchan do Zanjeer in place of Dev Anand? And didn’t Mr Bachchan say yes to Deewaar after Rajesh Khanna opted? These things happen all the time. Like I said it’s a small world.”

Split, actually or just a gimmick?

Here’s another quake hitting bold and beautiful Bollywood. The made for each other couple, Arbaaz Khan and Malaika Arora Khan, have separated and will be seeking talaq, going by the indisputable indications.

This comes soon after the stunning, overnight as it were, split between Shahid Kapur and Kareena Kapoor, looked upon as the head-over-heels in love pair for quite some time.

While both Shahid and Kareena kept their counsel, Shahid rose in the esteem of his fans for playing the dignified lover being dumped after all those wild quotable quotes about their everlasting love and their tongue wrestling in a public place MMS.

Kareena, who is now looked upon as the coolest babe on Saif Ali Khan’s arm (and in his arms), fell for Saif during the outdoors of Tashan and the news plopped out just prior to the release of Shahid-Kareena’s only hit, Jab We Met.

Saif, just out of his torrid relationship with Italian bomb, Rozza Catalano, has gone through the pleasant agony of tatooing Kareena’s name on his arm, and Kareena is in the euphoric quoteable quote mode again as if nothing or Shahid ever happened only the other day!

Of course, true to showbiz type, both Saif and Kareena are also emphasising to everyone who cares to listen, that their career is on the upswing at the moment, and certainly they will marry, but don’t see that happening before another five years.

The emergency exit for another couple of Shahids and Rozzas to happen in the next five years.

On the surface, the Arbaaz Khan-Malaika Arora affair looked a lot more cool and dignified, and the eyebrow raising was because people couldn’t believe that what they were seeing was worth believing. They seemed to be too genuinely happily married to be true. And they lasted all of 10 years and a five-year-old son, Arhaan.

After his much touted acting debut in Daraar, where he played a debonair sunglassed villain, Arbaaz’s career never took off, despite the family film where all three Khan brothers played stellar roles, Hello Brother.

He managed two-and-a-half roles in the years since, but all of them rather insignificant. The last we saw him in was Apoorva Lakhia’s Shootout At Lokhandwala, starring Sanjay Dutt, in which he played a dashing cop, buit the film was not a commercial success either.

Malaika, on the other hand, was a high-profile model and hit the Bollywood jackpot by swivelling her hips with Shah Rukh Khan atop a moving train.

Dil Se’s Chhaiyaan Chhaiyaan made her a memorable item girl, and she made her sexual presence felt as a ‘love and agony aunt’ anchor on television and make cleaage and leg showing appearances at glitzy parties and inaugurals. Kaante’s Mahi ve and Welcome’s Hoth Rasiley, also added punch to her power as an item girl.

In a split-second appearance among a galaxy of Bollywood stars in Heyy Baby and Om Shanti Om, both the sisters Malaika and Amrita Arora are seen shaking their booty, along with Arbaaz!

When a television channel, Live India, broke the story late last night (April 16) and asked the couple separately about the divorce, Arbaaz and Malaika neither confirmed nor refuted the news, but their replies were loaded.

“It is my private life and I would not like to discuss it in public,” Arbaaz said, adding, “Life is uncertain and no one knows what will happen tomorrow.”

Malaika seemed to be pretty shaken and also asserted, weakly though, “It is too personal and I would like to keep quiet on this issue.” When reminded that keeping quiet on such issues indicates trouble, Malaika reiterated, “I believe silence is golden.”

The news comes as a surprise especially at a time when Malaika and Arbaaz are getting ready for their Kannada film together, Shaadi Ke Side Effects. The film, which is ironically about marriage and infidelity, casts Malaika in her first lead role.

It could just be a publicity gimmick for the film, but their reactions did not seem to indicate that. Even the Kareena-Shahid split was initially supposed to be a gimmick for pushing Jab We Met.

Arbaaz and Malaika’s 10-year-old marriage is to end, it can safely be concluded, unless there is a last minute reconciliation.

They have one son, Arhaan, from this marriage and people have always looked on in awe at the couple’s successful bonding despite a failed career of Arbaaz and Malaika always being the hot-bod model mom who even appeared in various stages of undress in Maxim recently, but with a total understanding between the couple.

Ten years of mutual respect between a high-profile couple is not usual in Bollywood or showbiz. That is why this comes as a shocker, coming as it is without any runway clues.

The news trickling in is that Arbaaz has found a new love with whom he is living secretly at a Bandra property. Even during the Shahid-Kareena affair, there were rumours of the goody-goody Shahid having been seen with co-star Amrita Rao too many times.

Kareena is supposed to have spit fire and doused any flame waiting to break out. But here, Arbaaz has actually separated from Malaika, his wife since 1997 and mother to five-year old Arhaan, two weeks ago.

A friend of Malaika has told the media, “Malaika and Arbaaz have stopped communicating with each other completely. She is not even aware where Arbaaz is.”

Arbaaz, on the split and a rumoured second marriage, says, “I don’t want to comment on my personal life or on Malaika. Why is the press so impatient? They will know whether I’m remarrying or not in due time. I will probably talk about it soon. At this moment I don’t want to say anything further.”

Goodbye Kareena, Enter Priyanka!!!

Shelving plans of making a bio-pic on the life of the Bollywood stunt queen Fearless Nadia, Vishal Bhardwaj has now embarked on another more contemporary cinematic journey.

After making a pain-lashed Shakespearean love story with Ajay Devgan and Kareena Kapoor, he has now moved on to Kareena’s ex-boyfriend Shahid Kapoor and her arch -rival Priyanka Chopra for a full-on feel-good love story.

However contrary to reports Vishal’s film is NOT a new version of Romeo & Juliet.

“People would love to see me complete my Shakespearean trilogy after Macbeth (Maqbool) and Hamlet (Omkara). But I’m not doing Romeo & Juliet,” says Vishal.

While Shahid is confirmed, Priyanka currently shooting in Miami for Tarun Mansukhani’s Dostana is still in talks. She is expected to give her nod when she returns to Mumbai in May.

For the boyish Shahid the shortage of leading ladies after Kareena’s departure acquires an interesting twist with co-stars as varied as Vidya Balan, Jiah Khan and now Priyanka Chopra coming up besides him in the

Shahid Kapoor falls in love again

Shahid Kapoor no longer remembers his stick-thin ex-girlfriend Kareena Kapoor because he has a cute, chubby little girl in his life now named Radhika.

Now don’t rattle your brain folks ‘coz Radhika is a one year old baby and Shahid’s co-star in Ken Ghosh untitled flick

A laughing Ken said, “Yes, Radhika is the new babe in Shahid’s life. She has a small role in the film and from the day they met they couldn’t keep their hands off each other. It was instant chemistry! Forget Vidya, Sania and Amrita Rao, Shahid had eyes for no one else but Radhika!”

Shahid who has a younger teenage brother has always loved kids but Radhika seems to be special for him. Radhika and Shahid share a great rapo and whenever they get free from the shooting they spend time with each other laughing, playing and chatting in gobbledygook. The pretty young baby is so smitten by handsome Shahid that the moment she sees him she stops crying and stars laughing.

Looks like Shahid’s fatherly instincts are beginning to show at the age of 27. Would we be seeing Shahid with his very own Radhika anytime soon? Well it’s for you to guess.