‘Kaminey’ is a good success, critically as well as commercially, and now all of a sudden Shahid Kapoor finds himself in the super big league. While the Khans (Shah Rukh, Aamir, Salman) have been dominating from the top along with Akshay Kumar and Hrithik Roshan, the success of ‘Kaminey’ means that both Shahid Kapoor, as well as Saif Ali Khan are both making the Top-5 actors uncomfortable.
As this Vishal Bharadwaj film continues to fetch audiences and reactions for itself in it’s second week, Shahid Kapoor looks forward to the release of two more films before the end of year. These are ‘Dil Bole Hadippa’ opposite Rani Mukherjee and ‘Chance Pe Dance’ opposite Genelia D’Souza. Isn’t it too much happening all on one go?
“Yes, it is actually quite a lot”, agrees Shahid who is currently also shooting for Yash Raj Films’ next which has Parmeet Sethi as the director and Anushka Sharma as his co-star, “Usually I have had one release a year. Last year I had just ‘Kismat Konnection’. However, 2009 has been a busy year.”
He understands though that over exposure is a twin edged sword.
“Yeah, I know that three releases in succession could work out both ways”, he smiles, “‘Kaminey’ has started the year well for me and I would want the momentum to work to continue. I am happy thought that thankfully each of my three films, whether ‘Kaminey’, ‘Dil Bole Hadippa’ or ‘Chance Pe Dance’, are extremely different movies. If at all they were similar films then it would have been a disaster for me.”
He is also enjoying working with variety of co-stars in each of his films. While ‘Kaminey’ had one of the top female actors of today, Priyanka Chopra, ‘Dil Bole Hadippa’ sees Rani Mukherjee making a comeback of sorts. And then in ‘Chance Pe Dance’, he has upcoming Genelia D’Souza who incidentally replaced Jiah Khan in this Ken Ghosh directed film.
“Due to fresh casting, it only makes these projects further interesting”, says Shahid, “I have not worked with any of my female co-stars before, so for me too it was a new experience shooting with them for these films.”
He laments the fact that producers’ strike did play a major role in a sudden rush of releases.
“Everyone in the industry faced the heat due to this. ‘Kaminey’ was supposed to arrive at least a couple of months back, but due to the strike, we had to move ahead. At the end of the day I am an actor, and the producers and distributors decide which film of mine releases in what order and frequency. ‘Dil Bole Hadippa’ and then ‘Chance Pe Dance’ are now coming in succession though from year 2010 on, I guess it would be a sane state for me with at maximum a couple of releases a year”, concludes Shahid hopefully.
— By Joginder Tuteja
