Cannes, May 18: Bombay Dreams, the musical, is to be made into a big-budget film.
The venture will be a collaboration between Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Really Useful Group in the UK, and Marquee Pictures, a Beverley Hills-based US film production company. Canada-based Deepa Mehta, much admired for her trilogy Earth, Fire and Water, will direct the film in 2011, once she has completed the movie adaptation she is currently working on of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children. The musical ran successfully for two years before opening in 2004 in Broadway where it did less well. However, the triumph of Slumdog Millionaire, which took eight Oscars in 2009, appears to have convinced the Americans that now is the propitious moment to turn Bombay Dreams, the stage musical, into a movie. The story of an Indian slum boy, who wants to make it big in tinsel town, epitomises the Hollywood and the American dream. Mehta's husband, David Hamilton, a producer on many of her films, said in Cannes: "A.R. Rahman, who wrote the music for the musical, is writing some new music for the film. The people behind the project are very serious about making the film." The screenplay will be written by Sabrina Dhawan, acclaimed writer of the much loved Monsoon Wedding, which was directed by Mehta who commented: "Bombay Dreams has a rich and compelling story, appealing characters and a satisfying interplay of comedy, romance and the dramatic. It really is the ideal musical to adapt for film." Lloyd Webber, who can claim substantial credit for introducing Rahman to the western world, said: "I am very proud to have presented Bombay Dreams in Britain where it was a ground-breaking show. It was deeply rewarding for me to see Rahman's work recognised in America when he won two Oscars and I am thrilled to be working with him again on this exciting project." Rahman returned the compliment: "I have had a wonderful collaboration with Andrew. And now I am very happy to continue this collaboration. I have worked on more than 100 movies, and believe that this may be my most exciting project." In 1998 Lloyd Webber went to the Hammersmith Lyric to see Fourteen Songs, Two Weddings and a Funeral with Parminder Nagra in the lead, the Tamasha Theatre Company's brilliant musical adaptation of the Bollywood blockbuster Hum Aapke Hain Kaun. Seeing the musical encouraged Lloyd Webber to take the gamble of making Bombay Dreams. Shekhar Kapur, the director currently serving on the Cannes jury, put him in touch with Rahman. When the musical first opened, British critics predicted it would not last more than a few weeks at most. Indians, living in the UK and visiting from the UK, made them eat humble pie. Steve Wilkinson, who has a background in theatre and whose company Azure has provided development funding for the film, said in Cannes: "While every production has an inherently uncertain outcome in the marketplace, Bombay Dreams, with its amazing musical pedigree and an award-winning production team, has a chance of becoming one of the great musical films of the decade." It is worth recalling Lloyd Webber's tart reaction when a Hindutva type asked him why he had not called his musical Mumbai Dreams. "Mumbai Dreams has no music," he shot back. http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100519/jsp/frontpage/story_12464861.jsp
