    
Bignole
Vooriki Bewarse
Username: Bignole
Post Number: 3036
Registered: 03-2004
Posted From: 64.83.223.150
| | Posted on Friday, November 26, 2004 - 8:33 am: |    |
The two apex bodies of the film industry – the Movie Artistes Association (MAA) and the Film Producer’s Council had a meeting last month and discussed several issues. The president of MAA, Mohan Babu and the newly elected Producer’s council president K.S Rama Rao that the both the parties spoke about the reduction in remuneration of the lead artistes.
Says senior producer Rama Naidu says, “The artiste remuneration in the past used to be only 25-35% of the budget. But today, the remuneration exceeds the production costs – thanks to the highly-priced heroes and heroines.” While the Box Office Kings like Chiranjeevi, NTR and Nagarjuna retain a few areas for themselves, smaller artistes like Ravi Teja, Prabhas, Allu Arjun are charging anywhere between 75 lakhs and 2 crores. The two seniors who are flexible when it comes to pricing is only Victory Venkatesh and Balakrishna.
What propels these young artistes to hike their remunerations by leaps and bounds with just one hit in their kitty? Says trade analyst Somnath, “When producers are offering such prices, why would they deny it. Also, the career spans of heroes too are becoming like heroines. Not all can last for decades, so they make as much money they can when they are in demand.”
If these are the prices quoted by heroes, the heroines are not far behind. The Bombay bombshells act in telugu movies only if offered a fortune. The top heroine heading the list is Amisha Patel. Though she is paid only 40 lakhs for an average Bollywood film, the price she quotes for a telugu film is three fold at 1.2 crores! But ofcourse, nobody would pay a heroine so much. But the makers of NTR-B.Gopal’s next film paid her a huge 85 lakhs for their film. Hawaii-babe Katrina Kaif comes next, who demands 75 lakhs per film. The reason she gives for charging so high is, “If I allot the same 40 days for modeling, I get paid over a crore. So, I am giving a preference to movies by acting for lower price.” But, in a latest David Dhawan film opposite her boyfriend Salman Khan, she is just paid a meager 30 lakhs. If these two belong to the A+ category, the heroines in most demand in the A-category are Trisha and Genelia who demand 40 lakhs for allotting 45 days of their callsheets. And they have a lot of takers, as these two girls have created a place for themselves in Tollywood. The earlier reigning queen was Shriya followed by Arthi Agarwal who are no more in much demand, as they have been over-exposed onscreen and have been cast opposite, almost every big hero.
The latest export is Gaur Khan, who charged 5 lakhs for doing an item song in Shankar Dada MBBS, shooting just for 3 days. Former Miss India, Celina Jaitley who delivered two flops – Khel and Janasheen in Hindi, is getting paid a handsome sum of 25 lakhs for her latest film opposite Vishnuvarshan Manchu. Other south Indian actresses like Sneha, Asin and Meera Jasmine come approximately for a price of 20-25 lakh per film. Those who are out of roles these days are Rakshita, Rekha, Gajala, Sada who have moved into other small regional industries like Kannada, Tamil and Malayalam.
Mainstream Bollywood heroines refuse to act in South Indian movies, though they are paid a filthy sum as the trade industry there ‘black marks’ a heroine that she moved South-wards only because she had run out of roles in Hindi films. The exception to this rule is only when the film is being made by a Mani Ratnam, Ram Gopal Verma or has a Chiranjeevi or Rajinikanth starring in it.
For the film Shankar Dada MBBS, the remunerations and production cost were in the ration 1.3:1. Though there is no fixed solution to this problem, the producers seems to have come to a mutual agreement with each other not to compete and offer sky-high prices to the artistes. Also, MAA plans to set some “moral guidelines” to be followed by the artistes regarding remuneration and demanding services from the producers like Business class tickets, 5-Star hotel stays. Let’s see, what the outcome of this proposal will be.
(c) NonstopCinema.com 2003.
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