Art & Entertainment

How Hot Is Ash, Really?

The knives are out. And the ex-beauty queen's Hollywood dreams, riding on Bride and Prejudice, look like hitting the bumps. Will Bollywood and 2005 offer succour?

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How Hot Is Ash, Really?
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Time
Guardian
Bride and Prejudice
Time
Hello
Bride
Bride's
Bride
Shark Tale
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Variety
Bride
Shark Tale
Shark Tale
Bride
Saw, Resident Evil
Layer Cake
Bride
Bend It Like Beckham
Shark Tale
Bride's
Bride
Bride
Chaos
Mistress of Spices
Nisha Sharma
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Ash herself has been lying low, harping on her commitment to Bollywood instead. "When I acted in Chokher Bali, nobody asked if I was moving to Bengali cinema. I am just broadening my experience. We actors are like gypsies. We'll travel where work takes us," she said in between her characteristic giggles at a press conference in Delhi. But her Bollywood roots do need some serious attention. There are no big banner Hindi films in sight, save Rituparno Ghosh's Raincoat and Leena Bajaj's Shabd. The trade too is unwilling to accept her as Heroine No. 1. "She became No. 1 by default, we needed someone to replace Kajol," says Komal Nahata of Film Information. "She is a media star, not a box office star," says Vinod Mirani of Box Office. "She's a cosmetic wonder," film critic Deepa Gahlot pitches in. So, is this the wonder who's reportedly charging Rs 2 crore a film but hardly has three films to show for as hits (the last being Devdas a good two years back)? Last year, her attempts to turn producer came a cropper with the disastrous Dil Ka Rishta. She got into the bad books of producers by walking out of Aamir Khan starrer The Rising and also lost SRK's Chalte Chalte to Rani Mukherjee. Both her releases this year Kyun...! Ho Gaya Na and Khakee were so-so. And now early reports say Bride is not doing too well either, working only in the city multiplexes and that too in the original English version. Nahata says it should show 50 per cent all-India collections in the first four days of its release but Sony Pictures, which helped distribute the film in India, are convinced it'll end up in the top 5 films of the year. "It won't be a huge revenue-scorcher. It will be average," says Tushar Dhingra ofPVR Cinemas, Delhi.

Meanwhile, Ash claims to have two new big Bollywood projects up her sleeve on which we'll hear more soon. Then, of course, there are the crores worth of endorsements—L'Oreal, Nakshatra, Longines. The Bollywood fraternity is standing strong behind her too. "She's a big star...she just needs a few hits to live up to the hype," says Farah Khan. "She will reassess her market and survive," says Mahesh Bhatt. "Ash has far too much momentum, far too much following in India to be written off with one film," says Kakkar. Problem is, it's been one flop too many.

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