Stingy stars

A RICH man who had gathered an overflow of his harvest said, “I will tear down my barns and make bigger ones to store all the grain.” And God said to him, “You fool, this very night your life will be demanded of you.” Perhaps some of our stars can take a cue.

They earn in big bucks but apparently, want even more!

Star couple Ajay and Kajol Devgan attended a photo shoot for a magazine cover and came to the studio in one car. Yet when they were leaving, each separately asked for payment for one driver. And it didn’t stop at that, they also charged for separate petrol money for the same car.

Then there’s the newfound Isha Khopikkar who must have heard or read about how star tantrums are in fashion. So at a particular magazine shoot, she shocked the people with a bill of Rs.5000, presented by —hold on —her driver, for food! Incidentally, Isha feigned ignorance while her driver doggedly followed the reporter with the bill.

There’s also talk of one rather unhappy hairdresser and one unhappy make-up artiste, who worked for Juhi Chawla. While they were reportedly paid a meager salary by Ms. Chawla, their earning came via the money they earned from producers whose sets they worked on, for their shifts. But apparently, Juhi would collect the shift money and pay them half the amount from it.

The lean and fit Akshay Kumar is said to tick like a taxi metre. For a particular shoot, he requested the people concerned to pay an exorbitant amount to a fashion designer for the outfit he wore and then took the outfit home too. Besides, he apparently makes you pay for his hairstyling and barbering too, at none less than the J.W. Marriott Hotel.

The polished Celina Jaitley sometimes allows one a glimpse of the tarnish underneath. While shooting at her home once, a magazine provided lunch for all, which was stored in Celina’s kitchen. There was no sign of Celina’s maid serving lunch to a hungry crew once the all day shoot was over. But the story doesn’t end there. Rushing into her car to continue with the interview, Celina grabbed some of the said food and chomped away in face of one hungry reporter.

But these things date back to earlier stars as well. Lovely smile, great actress and dancer but Madhuri Dixit had one little flaw. At any shoot, she’d get the people concerned to order lots of Chinese food from the Holiday Inn and then invite mummy, aunties and cousins over to share it. Incidentally, she followed this procedure while shooting at a hotel as well. Like the Sun ‘n’ Sand Hotel, where her relatives dropped in to see the shoot and stayed to lunch.

The bubbly vivacious Sridevi had one definite thorn in the sides of other people. Her pesky driver followed you around so much with his bills that you wished Sri would pack up and go home. Besides him there was also her spot boy who should have been the original star —he actually looked insulted if you refused to pay for his service to Sri. Never mind that he wasn’t helping you in any way…

Both Vivek Oberoi and Rani Mukherji do have one good habit. When food is ordered for them on the sets and they can’t finish all of it, they pack it up and take it home. The motto being: waste not, want not. All very well, until Vivek and Rani have started taking this a step further. Apparently they both now order double the amount of food and definitely take it home for mummy and daddy to share. All, at the poor producer’s expense of course.

And actress Suman Ranganathan has to have had the most thick-skinned secretary or suffers from the ailment herself. At a particular poolside shoot at the J.W. Marriott, lunch was offered to both. The secretary proceeded to order far more than food for two people, leaving the magazine people puzzled. All soon became clear when a couple of producers and henchman turned up and guzzled away.

Perhaps a lot of our stars need to look at ShahRukh Khan. If he’s made his money, he lives on it alone. Once long ago, his driver made the mistake of rudely demanding payment for driving Shah Rukh and Gauri to a photo shoot. When the Khans heard of this (and that he had done this more than once) they were so embarrassed that they eventually disengaged their driver from his services.