By Jilawatan

She was crowned the most beautiful woman in the world, but only after her performance in Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam was she praised for her acting skills as well as her good looks. Films like Devdas, Dhoom2, Guru and Jodhaa Akbar helped establish her firmly in Bollywood. Having worked in international productions like Bride & Prejudice, The Mistress of Spices and The Pink Panther 2, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is also one of the best known Indian faces in Hollywood. Married into the first family of the Hindi film industry, she is looking forward to releases like Raavan and Guzaarish this year, besides endorsing Longines.

What are you reading at the moment?
These days I am only busy reading scripts and nothing else.

If you woke up and found you’d turned into a man, you would…
Well, my approach would definitely be no different than that of most women. I would be very shocked!

By Jilawatan

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, the stunningly beautiful daughter-in-law of Amitabh Bachchan who sizzled in super duper hit flicks like ‘Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam’, ‘Dhoom’ , ‘Devdas’ and ‘Guru’ with the likes of Salman Khan, Hrithik Roshan, Shah Rukh Khan and Abhishek Bachchan, has been offered a talk show on television.

The offer has so much moolah and other benefits with it that Aishwarya is seriously considering it, and if her busy schedule permits the show will be on from next year. Her husband Abhishek Bachchan has already been signed for a game show ‘National Bingo Night’, which is going on air shortly.

Even, Amitabh Bachchan has been roped in by the channel to continue with the hosting of ‘Bigg Boss’ in its fourth season with a mind boggling amount. Big B had been paid Rs 1.5 crore per episode for the season three of Bigg Boss, and the remuneration for the fourth season has gone up even further.

By Jilawatan

Big news is that Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is making a third film with Sanjay Leela Bhansali called Guzaarish after Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and
Devdas, and it stars Hrithik Roshan.

The actress, trapped in the dense forests of Kerala with husband Abhishek for Mani Ratnam’s Raavan, took a call and spoke to BT about it. “We’ve evolved together, grown as individuals and artistes, we’re both similar — totally driven and passionate, the passion is mutually addictive, we don’t meet for months, but every time we meet — we pick up the threads effortlessly,” said Ash about her filmmaker friend.

By Jilawatan

Bollywood actress Aishwarya Rai is elated over bagging the main leads in two mega south Indian projects - Mani Ratnam’s Ravan and Shankar’s Endhiran.
“Shankar had approached me previously to work with him, but it never materialised. Finally, everything landed in place and here we are working together after 10 years,” said Aishwarya on the sets of Ravan.

Tamil superstar Rajinikant, who is playing the male lead in Endhiran, was also very keen to work with Aishwarya and had tried to sign her for his earlier ventures - Padaiyappa and Chandramukhi, but the actress could not spare the dates.

Speaking about Ratnam’s Ravan, in which she once again teams up with her husband Abhishek Bachchan, Aishwarya said: “I don’t want to reveal much about it. Working with Mani is always a delight. He is a man of perfection. I am lucky to act in his movies again and again.”

By Jilawatan
Verve’s undisputed power cover girl, India’s highest paid, most in-demand actor; international face of the country; recipient of a myriad film awards and the big daddy of them all, a Padma Shri, reminds me of a little girl on a Ferris wheel - spinning ever upwards, almost out of control in the frenzy of her life.

Today, she is closeted in her vanity van at N. D. Studio in Karjat with make-up artist, Ojas. She is busy putting on a face, which to me seems so unnecessary!

Earlier, fresh countenanced, tired-eyed but oh so beautiful, she had made flash decisions on gowns (no saris); colours (out with that dull mauve) and silhouettes. The world’s most beautiful woman (so says Julia Roberts!) standing there in black tights and silver-and-white tee, could have slipped into anything and looked like a million bucks.

By Jilawatan

Despite rumours Abhishek and Aishwarya Rai remain a happily married couple. The two celebrated their second marriage ceremony in Europe before returning back to India to shoot for their next Mani Ratnam film.

Earlier it was expected the two leading stars of the Indian filmdom will celebrate their wedding anniversary on the sets of the film Ravana. But finally they were able to enjoy a quite wedding anniversary somewhere in Europe.

Says a source, “Last year, Abhishek was slogging it out in Miami for Dostana and Aishwarya joined him there for their first Wedding Anniversary.

This year, they were again supposed to be working, though happily together, for the next schedule of Mani Ratnam’s Raavan on their anniversary.”

By Jilawatan

We are all waiting for the Ash-Abhi starrer Ravana with baited breath. This will be the first movie starring the couple since Guru, and as luck would have it, even this one is directed by Mani Ratnam. What few people know is that while Ash was always to be a part of Ravana, Abhishek wasn’t the first choice for the role of Rama.

It was instead, one actor who Ash has had a slightly terse relationship with - Shah Rukh Khan. After Mani Ratnam cast Ash, he told her that he intended to ask Shah Rukh to play opposite her. Since vibes between them have been better lately, Ash agreed.

Ratnam then approached Shah Rukh, who was only too happy to agree. He told reporters the sequence of events recently. “Yes Mani sir had spoken to me. Actually there were two reasons I said yes to him. I had given up on Idiots or they had thrown me out of it, anyway you want to look at it.

By Jilawatan

After getting fabulous performances out of Tabu in Maqbool, Kareena Kapoor in Omkara and hopefully, Priyanka Choopra in Kaminey, Vishal Bhardwaj is all set to team up with the one actress he has always wanted to work with.

Aishwarya Rai-Bachchan and Vishal Bhardwaj are finally getting together after many false starts. The project will go into production at the end of the year.

Says Aishwarya, “Vishal and I have wanted to work together ever since he was the music composer on a project that got shelved. We had promised one another that I’d start in his film whenever he turned director.

Right after his directorial debut in the children’s film Makdee Vishal had offered Aishwarya a film called Timbuctoo . That got shelved.

By Jilawatan

Aishwarya Rai undergoes training to sing classical Indian. Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is a thoroughly professional actress and she is ready to go the extra-mile to get under the skin of her character. For her upcoming movie, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan will undergo training in Indian classical singing.

According to news reports, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is going to play the character of Sita in Mani Ratnam’s movie, Raavan. The movie is based on famous Indian epic, Ramayana.

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan will be playing the character of Sita and hubby Abhishek Bachchan will play the character of Ram and Govinda will play the role of Hanuman.

In real life, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is quite a good singer but not good enough to sing classical songs. For her role, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan wants to sing all the songs by herself. She will take lessons from a guru.

By Jilawatan

Former World beauty queen and famous actress Aishwarya Rai Bachchan says that her character in ‘Ravana’ starring her husband Abhishek Bachchan isn’t that of our epic Ramayana’s Sita. In the same breath she admits, “Yes, I am playing a woman who has similarities with the Sita of ‘Ramayana’. Aish told this at the press conference of her new Hollywood flick ‘Pink Panther 2′. The actress has been shooting for ‘Ravana’ since Feb 17, and will continue till mid-March. When asked to elaborate her character in the movie, she refused to divulge more about ‘Ravan’. “However, it is an intense film set in today’s time and Mani Ratnam has given a totally new perspective to the art of storytelling,” she continued. She also emphasized that she had never played a conventional couple with her husband on-screen, apart from the film ‘Kuchh Naa Kaho’, though. She illustrated this by stating that neither in ‘Dhoom 2′ nor in ‘Sarkar Raj’ and nor in ‘Guru’, though the movie revolves around Abhishek.