The excuse may be shrinking budgets or inflated egos or, if you'd like to believe the filmmakers, the demand of the script, but new lead pairs seem to be here to stay in Bollywood. We saw one startling example last year in Wake Up Sid where Konkona Sen Sharma romanced the yuppie glam Ranbir Kapoor and ended up with a hit. This year, after the failure of the experimental Farhan Akhtar-Deepika Padukone pairing, the hot Imran Khan-Sonam Kapoor jodi made it to the hit gang. Though Sonam's Aisha with Abhay Deol did not set the cash registers ringing, their chemistry was refreshing.
So is ‘saleability be damned' the new mantra for Bollywood? Are the days of the perfect Bollywood jodi a thing of the past? Salman pairs up with first-timer Sonakshi Sinha in Dabangg , John Abraham will be seen with TV actor Sonal Sehgal in Aashayein , John yet again will be seen with casting director and writer-turned-actor and wife of Abbas Tyrewala Pakhi in Jhootha Hi Sahi (earlier 1-800-Love ), Ranbir Kapoor and Priyanka Chopra will come together in Anjaana Anjaani , Arjun Rampal, Kajol and Kareena get together in We Are Family, and Akshay Kumar and Aishwarya Rai dish up the season's hottest offering as an ageing couple in Action Replayy .
Forging new relationships
For a lot of youngsters and debutants, this may sound like manna from heaven. For existing heavyweights, it is mainly an exercise at forging new relationships (purely business, of course), while for some it may be the last resort.
Take Sonakshi, for instance. The young daughter of Shatrughan Sinha must be thanking her stars for making her debut opposite Salman as she is well-versed with her brother Luv's debacle earlier this year, thanks to poor marketing of his film and no known faces. Dabangg has given her enough mileage to bag at least two more films before her first even releases! As for Salman, well, older actors are constantly on the look out for new girls to feature opposite (think SRK-Deepika in Om Shanti Om , Akshay-Trisha in Khatta Meetha and Aamir-Asin in Ghajini ).
While there is no confirmation, Nagesh Kukunoor's Aashayein could in all probability be a good case of budget gone awry. The fact remains that this film, long in the oven, is seeing the light of day only due to the presence of John. The female lead, Sonal Sehgal, quit TV for films and had a rather bad start due to the delay. The last time Nagesh signed a first-rate star was with Tasveer (Akshay Kumar) which sank without a trace with most of the money having been spent on the actor. Obviously, John mustn't have come cheap. The option? Sign a new girl.
John's next release this year is Jhootha Hi Sahi with his director's wife Pakhi. Of course, it's a never-heard-before case. Apparently, Pakhi (also the writer of the film) wanted to cast only herself opposite the hunk. So Abbas Tyrewala ( Jaane Tu…Ya Jaane Na ) did the needful and a new couple was born. How did John agree? The ‘she's perfect for the role' argument, we are sure.
Priyanka Chopra is another one on the prowl for new actors to work with. So the younger Ranbir Kapoor is the one in Anjaana Anjaani, while in Vishal Bharadwaj's Saat Khoon Maaf she has seven lead actors ranging from Neil Nitin Mukesh and Irrfan Khan to Naseeruddin Shah. Of course, it is a casting coup of sorts but trust Vishal to choose according to the script. As for Ranbir's pairing with Priyanka, the response has been tepid since it appears that Piggy dear is trying too hard to appear young and peppy.
Arjun Rampal getting a film with both Kajol and Kareena is a big talking point. But the actual jodi making waves is that of Kareena and Kajol. How did two heavyweight female actors come together? For Kajol, it may be a defining character, but Kareena has possibly given her nod only to stay cozy with the once-estranged director-producer-friend Karan. The story about Kareena demanding a bomb for Kal Ho Naa Ho and the consequent fallout with Karan and her decline in Bollywood then is publicly known. With Kurbaan and We Are Family , the relationship gets a new lease of life. Kareena has also bagged Karan's Short Term Shaadi with Imran for which she is willing to pull out all stops. See, there is much more to a jodi than appears to the naked eye.
For long left out in the cold as none of the lead actors and she get along, Aishwarya Rai is now starring opposite Akshay Kumar. Let's line up actors she doesn't want to work with or vice versa: Salman Khan (obvious reasons), Shah Rukh Khan (for the fracas created by Salman on the sets of Chalte Chalte after which the former decided never to work with Ash, forget the logic) and Aamir Khan (for pulling out of Mangal Pandey ). Even Hrithik was out for a while thanks to the infamous kiss in Dhoom 2 giving the Bachchan family a few jitters. Left with little choice, Ash has finally got a film with Akshay and their pair seems matched, at least age-wise!
