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Karan Johar must see my film first
KHNH director readies for his star-studded next
Subhash K Jha
For
Nikhil Advani, the break from Karan Johar's Dharma Films was painful.
But there is a kal for Nikhil beyond Kal Ho Na Ho, and it's called
Salaam-e-Ishq.
And the film packs a punch with its large
starcast. "My film Salaam-e-Ishq doesn't have Salman Khan-Priyanka
Chopra, John Abraham-Vidya Balan, Akshaye-Ayesha Takia, Anil
Kapoor-Juhi Chawla, Sohail Khan-Perizaad Zorabian, Govinda and a South
African actress Shanon Esra, simply because I wanted to cram my second
film with stars. Salaam-e-Ishq has episodic love stories where the
courtship of six different couples' will be interwoven into one film.
Luckily for me, the six pairs of stars don't come together until the
final half hour of the film. Just imagine the headache it would have
been to co-ordinate all their dates," says Nikhil.
Considering
the mammoth starcast, Nikhil sounds more relaxed than he did after Kal
Ho Na Ho. "It was a tense time. The break from Dharma Films was
interpreted in different ways by people. Fortunately, the healing
process has started. I've resumed interaction with Karan Johar. In
fact, I'd want him to be one of the first people to see Salaam-e-Ishq
after its completion."
But how did the director get around
convincing so many stars to come together? "You might not believe me
when I say that it didn't require much convincing at all. Salman was
with me from the start. Then I gave Akshaye the script. When he read
it, he recommended it to other actors. I think the script sold itself
to the stars," says Nikhil. He admits the format is akin to Richard
Curtis' Love Actually. "But Salaam-e-Ishq isn't a copy of Love
Actually. It's influenced by several other Hollywood films, like
Shortcut, Pulp Fiction and Magnolia.
These are the films I've
loved and learnt from. I admit the indoor sequences in Kal Ho Na Ho
were influenced by the American series Friends while the outdoor
sequences resembled Sex & The City. You cannot get away from your
past," he adds.
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