Malavika’s Mumbaistan: When BO stands for Box Office

Last week, Ronnie Screwvala had taken the battle to the beast’s lair when he questioned the corrosive and all-pervasive effect box office figures have on the industry.

It seems Ronnie Screwvala — the man who is said to be the most responsible for the corporatisation of the film industry, making it a viable respectable business way back in the nineties (when it was not unusual to have the words: shooting, gangster and film producer in the same headline) — the Parsi from south Mumbai’s theatre scene, is now determined to raise the bar even higher.

Ronnie Screwvala

Last week, Screwvala, who has to his credit blockbusters like Dev D, Delhi Belly, Peepli Live and collaborations with News Corp, 20th Century Fox and Walt Disney, among others, had taken the battle to the beast’s lair when he questioned the corrosive and all-pervasive effect box office figures have on the industry. “Isn’t it time everyone reports Box Office numbers accurately! Accuracy of information builds CREDIBILITY which the movie industry needs so badly...” he’d said signing off with the fighting words, “Not sure how long-to appease egos will Studios and all keep encouraging pumped up data on numbers”, tagging two of Bollywood’s biggest box office gurus in his tweet. Obviously the post had stirred a hornet’s nest and shortly after, Screwvala issued a clarification that his remark had not been about “any one movie (as is being wrongly assumed) but just an overall comment for the future + my reasons to tag some of the industry authorities was because they can make a difference to the credibility”.

But the genie was out of the bottle and a debate ensued on whether it was even necessary to share BO figures (that currently rule the industry and appear to dictate almost everything that occurs within it) with the general public at all.

“It was an overall tweet for all to take note that’s all,” said Screwvala yesterday, making his point again, from overseas. “The FOMO for all is everyone else does it so one needs to continue doing it and my point was anytime is a good time to start on 100% transparency and anyway the consumer does not care so why do it…”

Our bet is that if anyone can clean the Augean stable, and return films to the art form they are and not the commercial enterprises that they have become — it will be the doughty Parsi boy who became a path-breaking Bollywood producer!

The Prodigal’s Return

Raj Shahani

This evening will see a scoop of the city’s leading artists, and art and culture mavens gather at a gallery to view New York-based entrepreneur-turned-artist Raj Shahani’s preview of his debut exhibition of sculptures. We had first met Shahani at Brinda Miller’s studio, where he was described as a “fascinating man”, someone who had studied at Mumbai’s KC College and gone on to considerable success in entrepreneurship in America (being on the board of directors of Miss Teen America is only the more piquant of it), to now devote himself to his passion for sculpting and opera.

Titled ‘Caesura/Continuum’, the exhibition, which runs till mid-November, features works in ceramic and bronze of classic ballet figurines, several for which Shahani employed live models in his studio.

Another interesting fact about Shahani: he is said to jet continents for opera and helicopter across America — for food.

WTSWTM:

WTS:

“NCP boss Sharad Pawar is scheduled to meet Congress chief Sonia Gandhi on Monday. Pawar had on Saturday held a meeting with NCP leaders over possibility of forming a government.”

— Newspaper reports yesterday

WTM:

“Arrey Bol Radha, Bol Sangam, Hoga Ke Nahin.”

Blast From The Past: The Ultimate Orchestra

The RD Burman Orchestra flashback photo shared by Louis Banks.

When he’d first posted this sepia-tinged picture on social media four years ago with the words “The RD Burman Orchestra. Yours truly with dark specs.....” it was no surprise that jazz pianist/keyboardist and composer, aka The Godfather of Indian Jazz, Louis Banks, would receive a volley of delighted responses. “Ultimate photo of the legends of the music industry” was the general theme of the responses to this gathering of some of the film industry’s most iconic musicians, who’d given the country some of its most memorable anthems. Barman, fondly referred to as Pancham, had given Banks his first break in Bollywood.

This week, when it popped up, as these things do as a memory on one’s page Banks, requested his followers to identify those featured in the orchestra, and it gave rise to some poignancy and humour: whereas Bank’s circle was able to identify the legendary musicians in the portrait, Banks himself, looking every inch a rockstar in his snazzy shades, had been inadvertently been missed. But given that musicians are a happy bunch, and have a language of their own, “No more Cmin7 chord for him for 1 month” was the good-natured knuckle rap about the person responsible for the omission.

It must be a long-standing in joke.