Farah gifts script to SRK

Farah gifts script to SRK

Subhash K Jha

That Shah Rukh Khan spent his 40th birthday with close friends and family shooting for Karan Johar's Kabhie Alvida Na Kehna in New York is known. What's not known yet is what his buddies chose to gift him on his big day. As for Farah Khan, the gift for SRK was the script of her forthcoming film Happy New Year, in which the actor is supposed to play the lead role.

Says the choreographer-director, "Nothing about my film is finalised yet, except the producer and the main lead. And guess what? It's Shah Rukh! For the rest, I've to wait until my husband Shirish finishes writing the screenplay. I gifted the script to Shah Rukh on his birthday on November 2."

Farah sounds on top of the world, and it could be because she's perched on top of an elephant to shoot for Sony's Indian Idol Part 2. And the director could well be a tourist on an elephant. She is just visiting India. She was in New York last week to choreograph songs for her husband Shirish Kunder's Jaan-e-Man. "Free of cost of course," she grins, "In any case I never charged (producer) Sajid Nadiadwala any money. He's family.

Ab toh aur ghar ki baat ho gayi hai (It's all in the family now)." Now she's back in NY to do the choreography for Johar's film. And who knows, she might be attending the Oscars in LA next year!

"Wouldn't I love that?" she smiles. "Our film Paheli has gone. And the entire choreography of the Chinese entry Perhaps Love is done by me! I quietly flew to Shanghai earlier this year in May and completed all the dances. It was very interesting because of the language and also because the dances were a mix of the modern and period."

Perhaps Love, directed by Peter Chang is the most expensive musical to come out of China and Hong Kong in the last 35 years.

How did Farah wangle this prestigious project? "I don't know. I did no lobbying. They approached me and I was on."

Farah of course loved the experience of connecting with a completely alien culture and people. "We've to understand that modern art is no more a passport-motivated domain. I'm Indian but I felt no discomfort choreographing a Chinese film.

I'm as proud of Perhaps Love as I'm of Paheli…This was another challenge for me because I had never done classical Indian dancing before. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for both the films and would be happy if either makes it in the top five nominations list."

If Paheli does make it, sure enough, that would be yet another gift for SRK.