PRDP makers blackmailing theaters

Rajshri Productions and Fox Star Studios stand every chance of laughing their way to the bank with Salman Khan-Sonam Kapoor starrer Prem Ratan Dhan Payo, next week. So why not dictate terms?

That's exactly what the two production houses are doing. 9xe has it that they have told the theatres to cough up a higher advance than they normally pay if they want their film in their halls.

While multiplexes have been asked to shell out Rs 10 lakh instead of the usual Rs 5 lakh, single screens have been told to pay up 30 per cent more advance than they pay otherwise.

A source says, "This has never happened before. No producer in the history of Bollywood has been sticky on the advance that is normally paid by a theatre before the film is given to them for exhibition."

We hear, theatre owners are not happy with this diktat. Says the source, "Why are they not happy? Multiplexes will register collections to the tune of Rs 20 lakh in the first week itself.



This step has been taken simply because they don't settle the balance amount in time. They always defer on payments of films, howsoever profitable the film in question may have been. Barjatyas and Fox want lesser money of theirs to be blocked. What's wrong with that?"

The theatre owners have no option but to bow down to Prem Ratan Dhan Payo. Who will like not to have this Salman starrer in the festival of lights in his/her cinema?

Where does that leave the earlier diktat of Rajshri and Fox: We will pay the rentals of all single screens in India and run Prem Ratan Dhan Payo in those theatres as long as we want? (Will Salman's Prem Ratan Dhan Payo hamper Ranbir's Tamasha?, Oct 19) Says the source, "That very much stays. The rentals of theatres have nothing do with the advance."