CELEBS FACTORY

I plead guilty of saying that I would not make a Don sequel, but somehow the character just wouldn’t leave me. Now, in retrospect, I’m glad I’ve made Don 2,” admits producer-director Farhan Akhtar, who is gearing up for the response to the first trailer of one of this year’s most eagerly awaited films that unveils in theatres this Friday, along with the Farhan-starrer, Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara.

Farhan’s partner and co-producer Ritesh Sidhwani endorses the fact that despite an open ending, the duo had not thought of taking the story forward when Don—The Chase Begins (2006) ended. He says, “But then Ameet (Mehta) and Amrish (Shah) came to us with an interesting story idea. It took us a while to develop it, but finally, last October, we flagged off Don 2, and on December 23, as Shah Rukh (Khan) says in the promos, the don will return to the screen after five years.”

Ritesh agrees that expectations are sky high, but is confident that the high-speed action sequences, the special effects and the familiar characters in a new European setting, will spark off an ‘Oh my God, this is huge!’ reaction from the audience,from children in particular, who, he admits, is Don’s biggest fan base. “It surprised me that my own kids had taken such a fancy to a bad guy till I realised that the eternal favourite, Tom & Jerry, is a violent cartoon too.”

The filmmakers adds that apart from two new characters, enacted by Lara Dutta and Kunal Kapoor, the others played by SRK, Priyanka Chopra, Boman Irani and Om Puri, are the same from Part 1 and continue from where they had left. Ritesh says, “So Roma knows that the good Vijay is dead, Don has survived and sets out to even the score,” he says. “That twist at the end of Part 1 was what made it different from Mr Bachchan’s (Amitabh) Don. This one is completely new and original with no reference points but you would have to see Don —The Chase Begins to understand what’s happening. Don is on its way to becoming a franchise now. This time if you were to ask me about a Part 3, I wouldn’t say no.”

Moving onto the production of Housefull 2, sequel to Housefull which has already begun and the filmmakers have opted out for London as their first stop.

While things are running smoothing, not everything is going to plan as accordingly to reports, director Sajid Khan is having a difficult time in persuading his heroines, Asin Thottumkal and Zarine Khan into wearing a bikini.

Sajid wants to incorporate the same sort of glamorous look he did with the original Housefull, where his leading ladies, Lara Dutta, Deepika Padukone and Jiah Khan were seen dancing around in hot bikini’s.

But unfortunately, Asin and Zarine are just not comfortable in wearing one, and we don’t blame them, they certainly don’t match up to the likes of Sajid’s previous actresses. Though Zarine is said to have lost weight, we don’t think she could pull off a bikini just yet, and as for Asin she has clearly gained weight in the movie Ready.

On the other hand, heroine number three, Jacqueline Fernandez has given her director the green light and has absolutely no qualms about wearing a bikini. No surprises there!

We’re guessing Sajid never mentioned the bikini look with Asin and Zarine before they signed on the dotted line. Anyhow, the two stars have come across very confident about what they believe; they’re not called Salman Khan’s leading ladies for no reason.

Do you think Asin and Zarine are being unreasonable? Or are they doing the right thing?

We all know that Bollywood hottie Lara Dutta married her long time boy friend Mahesh Bhupathi in February 2011. Our new “IT” couple planned to postpone their honeymoon plans due to work commitments.