MUMBAI:
Bollywood Superstar Amitabhji aka Big B plays tennis, violin and piano par excellence. And, of course Teen Patti too!
The “Teen Patti” director Leena Yadav says the megastar not only spells magic in front of the camera but surprised everyone with his expertise in tennis, violin and piano as well.
“Mr. Bachchan is good in so many things. We were in awe. When we were shooting, we used to play games and we saw how perfect he is in tennis,” Yadav told in an interview.
Yadav said there was a scene in the film where Bachchan’s character had to play violin. “I got an expert to train him and kept telling him that the expert wants to show him how to hold the violin. But Mr. Bachchan insisted on doing it during the shot. When he came to the floor, the expert was standing to show him but he took the violin, placed it rightly and started playing perfectly. He played the piano also. He surprised us in many ways,” Yadav recalled.
Releasing Friday, “Teen Patti” features Amitabh Bachchan as a mathematician trying to evolve a thesis on probability by relating it to the Indian card game of ‘teen patti’. The film also stars Hollywood legend Ben Kingsley.
Yadav, who co-scripted the movie with Shiv Subramanyam, reveals that the probability theory Bachchan tries to prove is absolutely fictitious, but insists it is applicable to card games to some extent.
'Teen Patti' partly dubbed for single screen: Producer
Fri, Feb 26 01:37 PM
Mumbai, Feb 26 (IANS) The English conversation between actors Amitabh Bachchan and Ben Kinsley in the forthcoming film 'Teen Patti' has been dubbed in Hindi for the single screen audience, producer Ambika Hinduja of Serendipity films said.
The movie has been directed by Leena Yadav.
'In the movie Mr. Bachchan's character Venkat is narrating his journey to Perci Trachtenberg (Ben Kingsley). Of course, Sir Ben doesn't speak Hindi. Their conversation is in English. Those particular scenes, which come at a very important juncture in the movie, have been dubbed for the single screen audience,' Hinduja told IANS.
'Mr. Bachchan has dubbed for himself and Boman Irani has dubbed for Sir Ben,' she added.
Hinduja maintains that though the film is releasing worldwide, it has not been dubbed for the overseas non-traditional market but has been subtitled for some selected regions.
'Currently the worldwide release is Feb 26. We are starting with the traditional territories. We have got some non-traditional territories like Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon and Syria that have shown keen interest in the film and we are releasing it there. For the Middle East, Gulf and these non-traditional territories we have subtitled the film in English and Arabic,' said Hinduja.
Around Rs.30 crore was spent on 'Teen Patti.' It is going to have a big release with 900 prints for India and abroad along with 1700 UFOs (digital print). Serendipity films is still negotiating with some countries who have shown an interest in releasing the film.
'We have 900 prints for India and overseas along with 1,700 UFOs. Every single day we get calls to release the film in Europe and in some Southeast Asian countries, but you know the deal has to make sense for us so we are going to exploit it peacefully,' said the producer.
This is her second film after 'Being Cyrus' (2005) which was directed by Homi Adajania and her first mainstream Hindi film.
Hinduja involved herself with every frame of 'Teen Patti'.
'I am the creative producer and was involved in every aspect, stage and process of the film and the making of it. Because it is my second film and the first mainstream film, I wanted to give it my best and establish my company with 'Teen Patti',' said Hinduja.
Asked about the genre of the film, she said: 'I can't give a specific genre to 'Teen Patti'. It is a thriller, a drama and it's a film for the global audience. It deals with a universal theme like greed, deception, relationships and most importantly achievements and all of us across the globe can identify with these particular themes. '
The movie was invited by 12 film festivals but Hinduja didn't accept any of them because of a fear of piracy.
'We were invited by 12 film festivals, but piracy is a big threat. For example, the movie 'What's your Raashee' was screened at the Toronto film festival five days before its release and it was out in the market before the release. For a movie like 'Being Cyrus' there was no competition in the market, there was no threat; it was first of its kind so we took it to various festivals. It was highly appreciated and after being written about, we released the film,' said Hinduja. |
