I just get a giggle out of today’s news items and can’t resist sharing them.  Sometimes celebrity news is very silly!  Oh, and some of this stuff is actually interesting too.

Rishi’s Beard

I noted in the post on Sonam’s wedding that Rishi has a beard and it looks good on him.  Good news is, he’ll be keeping that beard a while.  The bearded look is for a thriller film with Jeethu Joseph co-starring Emraan Hashmi.  Which is very exciting!  Jeethu Joseph should make a smooth transition to Hindi, his tight thriller type films will easily translate from Malayalam.  And Emraan is great in thrillers, and I trust Jeethu to ensure he has a little more to do than kiss and shoot a gun.  Rishi is supposed to be an “investigator” which is a very interesting idea, not the villain but also not the sole hero, I assume a joint hero or second lead to Emraan.

Most importantly, Rishi is filming this film simultaneously with another one Jhootha Kahin Ka which means he will have to be bearded in both.  Fine with me!  The beard looks great on him. (source)

John’s Money

The Parmanu fight continues.  Now that it has reached court, there is a threat of it going into receivership, the court taking charge and dividing up any remaining assets among the interested parties.  This is why people don’t want to go to court.  Not just in India, and not just in Indian film, but anywhere.

My father is a lawyer, and his lesson was “once you go to court, everyone has already lost”.  The goal is to avoid it at all costs, because an out of court settlement and negotiation is always going to be a happier ending for everyone concerned, plaintiff and defendant (defendant?  Or is there another word for a civil case?) alike.

The judge has given the parties involved one last chance to work it out amongst themselves, and a deadline of May 10th (tomorrow).  Which is what the judge is supposed to do, no one wants a real verdict in these kinds of cases, but the threat of one is usually enough to force compromises and solutions.  This time, it looks like the current open bills will be paid by John, with a hope that the eventual profits and his direct partners (Zee studios) will help repay him.  KriArj is cut out of the picture, they have not yet submitted financial reports and so on.

I assume, if the case were allowed to drag on, the goal would be to show that KriArj has assets, to claim them on behalf of the people they owe money to, and so on.  But that could take months, or years, and meanwhile the film isn’t released and people are paying lawyers fees and so on.  This is the “if you go to court, everyone has already lost” problem.  Much better to just quietly solve it out of court if at all possible.

Oh, and the fact that John is being so mature and competent and so on, and working directly with the multinational mega studios, makes me hope that the myth of KriArj and other middleman companies being necessary will evaporate.  Clearly Zee should have just worked with John from the get go and it all would have turned out much better than trying to go through some “professional” something or other. (source)

(Just because he’s pretty doesn’t mean he isn’t smart!)

 

Salman’s Tuxedos

Salman is supposed going to have 45 different custom made tuxedos for Race 3.  Fun game for us all, be prepared to go to the theater with a pen and paper to check off each one as it appears.  Or else they are 45 identical tuxedos to be used if one of them tears scene to scene.  But I hope they are 45 different ones and his character just always wears tuxedos, rain or shine, tuxedos to bed and tuxedos to brunch and tuxedos to shower. (source)

(Tuxedo!)

 

Race 3’s Trailer

How did I not know Remo D’Souza is directing Race 3?  Well, this greatly lowers my interest in the film.  I love Remo for stupid dance films, but for twisted thrillers, I want Abbas-Mustan to direct themselves.  Oh well, I will try to keep hope alive.  Oh, and this ties into the John Abraham story too!  Abbas-Mustan isn’t directing, or producing, because the rights to the series are owned by Tips, not them.  I don’t like this AT ALL, I wish the creative minds had direct possession of their concept and I am worried about Race 3 letting down the series because of that.

(What if there isn’t a sexy song with an actress in spangled clothes?  Will it even feel like a Race film without it?)

Anyway, trailer!  There still isn’t one and the film is releasing in less than two months.  Here is the rumored reason.  The producers have upped the distribution price super high and are waiting for a distributor to bite.  And they won’t release the trailer until after that.  Because if the response to the trailer is bad, they could lose bargaining positions.

Well, this is a very bad sign for the film!  Usually it is the opposite, you release the trailer, or at least let the distributors see a song or something from the film, it gets them excited, the price goes up.  But, if I am reading this correctly, the fear is that if the distributors see something from the film, instead of the “on paper” factors of a successful series, a big name star, and so on, they will not want to pay for it?

Oh, and it’s also a fascinating view of the kind of “what the market will bare” finances within the industry.  Changing plans and trying to catch a profit wave last minute like this, that means any kind of “projected profits” planning for a studio is a joke, you never know what next Friday will bring.  And rather than sticking with your plan, you are going to respond to the market immediately.

This is why Dharma and YRF are so solid.  There is a kind of gloss to their films, a promotional strategy, and certainly a set list of cast members, which make them interchangeable.  But on the other hand, they do spread out the risk, releasing films in every genre every year.  Even if one fails, the other will hit, and the overall projections will remain steady.  But Tips, they are a lot more feast or famine.  Their film division might release 4 films a year, or none.  I’m guessing there is no long term planning, no projections, they take each project as it comes and try to make it the best it can possibly be, and then see where they are when it is all over. (source)