Bollywood star tackles Lloyd Webber
Mon 05:51 AM
BOMBAY (Reuters) - Bollywood actor Dalip Tahil’s dreams have come true: the movie star has landed a role in international playwright Andrew Lloyd Webber’s new musical “Bombay Dreams”.
Tahil, who has acted in over 100 films in roles ranging from a rich industrialist to a comic villain, will play a wealthy father opposed to his daughter’s love for a man living in a slum in the musical which will open in London’s West End in June.
“I have been playing the father kind of roles in Hindi films. Now I’ll be doing it on the London stage,” Tahil, who played a lead role in an Indian adaptation of Webber’s “Evita” years ago, told Reuters.
“It is a wonderful part to play. I will be singing two songs,” he said.
The musical set in the western Indian city of Bombay takes off on the popular Bollywood rags-to-riches story by following the fortunes of a young man brought up in a city slum who becomes rich.
The Indo-Western musical extravaganza, which also has some Hindi words to lend it an authentic touch, is seen as a manifestation of the west’s new-found love affair with Indian cinema.
“The play is about people who come with hope to the city of their dreams and make it big in life,” Tahil said.
Some of the biggest names from Indian showbiz have been plucked for the new musical by the maker of huge hits such as “Cats” and “Phantom of the Opera”.
Shekhar Kapur, the internationally acclaimed director of “Bandit Queen” and “Elizabeth”, is working with Webber on “Bombay Dreams” and ace musician A.R. Rahman has composed music for the play.