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HOORAY FOR BOLLYWOOD! Bollywood rocks!
I grew up in love with the movie musicals of Hollywood and it certainly pointed me in my career direction in musical theater. But who would have thought that many years later, I would discover and become obsessed with another genre of movie musicals. I am totally enthralled - and amused - by the unique movie form that is created by the film industry in India. "Bollywood" is truly its own art form. It takes some getting used to, I suppose, but I have succumbed completely. Once you get past the idea that in the middle of a family crisis (there are lots of those in Bollywood films), everyone will burst into song-lipsynching while group dancing, then it is fabulous to watch. The dancing is addictive, sort of a combination of hip-hop and line dancing mixed with traditional Indian dance moves. I must have more and more of these movies. Even Broadway had a sampling of the Bollywood craze when Andrew Lloyd Webber produced Bombay Dreams in NYC, with music by one of Bollywood's more prolific composers A.R. Rahman.

My "Bollywood habit" is fed by watching the Asian-American Channel on cable when they air Bollywood films. And I am constantly getting more Bollywood DVDs and soundtrack CDs. I will admit that I am so obsessed that I went as a Bollywood dancer for Halloween 2005, and I dubbed Christmas 2005 as my Holly-Bolly Christmas and wore some of my South Asian-Bollywood style outfits to all the holiday parties. A good friend and I even attended a local Bollywood Stars concert in Dallas in June 2006, which featured such big stars as Salman Khan, John Abraham and Kareena Kapoor. Check out pics from the concert and read my "primer" on Bollywood Movies here:
Bollywood RockStars Concert Dallas 2006
Bollywood Bad Boy hunk Salman Khan.
Kareena Kapoor makes
a diva entrance.
John Abraham shows
why his fans love him in concert.
The hard-working Bollywood dancers.
bride Aishwarya Rai is known as the Queen of Bollywood. A former Miss World, she has become one of the biggest stars, thanks to such films as Devdas, Bunty Aur Babli, Kuch Naa Kaho, Mohabbatein, Kandukondain Kandukondain, and Bride and Prejudice, an International cross-over film featuring a modernized Indian retelling of the Austen classic. Ash is also one of the faces of cosmetic company L'Oreal and can be seen in US TV commercials. She is about to get a foot up in Hollywood, with a co-starring role in the Colin Firth-Ben Kingsley film The Last Legion being released in 2006.
If Ash is the Queen of Bollywood, the King is Shahrukh Khan (aka Shah Rukh Khan). Bollywood stars are prized as much for their acting as their dancing skills, and Shah Rukh ranks at the top in both. His fans act like he's a rock star at personal appearances, which is another interesting thing about Bollywood celebrities - many perform live onstage in "concerts" like the one I went to, recreating audience-favorite dance numbers from their films, including the lip-synching (Ashlee Simpson would fit right in ...). Shahrukh has many hit films to his credit, including Swades, Veer-Zaara, Main Hoon Na, Dil Se, Kal Ho Naa Ho, Devdas, Asoka, and Paheli. King Khan
Aamir Bollywood Pin-Up Boy Ranking right up there with Shahrukh, is another Khan, Aamir Khan. Aamir may be familiar to some American audiences thanks to his starring role in the Oscar-nominated foreign film Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India, a terrific film about a high-stakes cricket match sparked by the rivalry between an Indian and a British soldier during the days of the British East India occupation and control of India. Aamir is known as a perfectionist and has been known to spend months and even years working on a single film, which is unheard of in Bollywood, where films and stars crank out films faster than weekly US TV shows. Besides Lagaan, his films include Dil Chahta Hai, Ishq, Hum Hain Rahi Pyar Ke, Dil, Baazi, and The Rising: The Ballad of Mangal Pandey, which is another fabulous historically-based film like Lagaan.
Amitabh Bachchan become a Bollywood star in the 1970s and reigned at the box office in leading roles for many years. He had a career slump once he was no longer a "dashing young leading man" but has made an amazing comeback and is now the highly respected Elder Statesman of Bollywood. Amitabh also has started his own mini-acting dynasty in Bollywood - The acting Bachchans include his wife Jaya, and his son Abhishek, who is an up-and-coming Bollywood star. See him in his early films such as Sholay, Do Anjaane, Chupke Chupke, Zameer, and many more; then check out Amitabh in his "comeback career" which made him a star all over again, including Ek Ajnabee, Sarkar, Paheli, Parineeta, Deewaar, Lagaan, Mohabbatein, Hello Brother, Lal Baadshah, and the family saga Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham. Elder Statesman
Hrithik rules! Hrithik Roshan started out as a child actor in Bollywood and has grown into a handsome hunk of a leading man. His matinee-idol good looks and his amazing dancing skills consistently set female fans' hearts fluttering. And he is giving Shahrukh and Aamir a run for their money as Bollywood's most popular actor. His film credits include Na Tum Jaano Na Hum, Lakshya, Main Prem Ki Diwani Hoon, Fiza, Kaho Naa Pyaar Hai, Mission Kashmir, and Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham. You can also check him out as a child in Bhagwan Dada, Aasha, and Aap Ke Deewane.
Rani Mukerji (aka Mukherjee) is another stunning beauty with popular box office appeal (That's Rani in red at the top of this page). Bollywood stars also reign on the song video charts in India, and Rani's dance number as the courtesan in The Rising was a chart-topper. She can be seen sharing the screen with most of the aforementioned Bollywood stars on this page, including Paheli, Bunty Aur Babli, Veer-Zaara, Kal Ho Naa Ho, Hum Tum, Chalte Chalte, Pyaar Diwana Hota Hai, and Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham, which is power-packed with stars, including Shahrukh, Hrithik, Amitabh and wife Jaya.

There are tons more Bollywood stars and films I love, such as Amisha Patel, Bipasha Basu, Preity Zinta, John Abraham, Saif Ali Khan, and more. But I can't afford the webspace to cover them all, so search the web for more Bollywood info.