No rest for the wicket
No rest for the wicket
Cricketer Suresh Raina at a promotional event in Juhu on Monday
Happy 50th
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WE must confess to getting our cheap thrills from a cat fight, especially one that involves two grown hulking men. We are talking about the literary biff-pow between writer and impresario William Dalrymple and the talented and mercurial Aatish Taseer. And even though the events that you’re about to read of happened in July, details are just emerging on the Delhi grapevine. Dalrymple, who puts together the splendid Jaipur lit fest with Namita Gokhale, wrote to Aatish in mid-July inviting him to be part of a panel on the Partition and Manto, as Taseer has translated SH Manto’s work. The mail, which hints at past bad blood between the two men, is conciliatory in tone with Dalrymple saying, “I would be delighted if you would accept this offer in the reconciliatory spirit it was intended. It may well be that we are not destined to be friends, even if we share many friends and interests in common, but I don’t really see that either of us gain anything by continuing these pointless hostilities...” Aatish, unappeased and cut to the quick by the fact that his latest novel, The Way Things Were, finds no mention either in Dalrymple’s mail or at Jaipur, responds with a curt mail of his own. “Willy, even you must know that you don’t write to a writer in the week that he has published his most important work yet, and not so much as mention it. What is Manto compared to what I have achieved in The Way Things Were? Do you really believe that I don’t know the worth of my own work...Let me make this simple for you: go away and read my book. Then sit down and put in words your own admiration of it. After that I will gladly take seriously your invitation.” Phew.
Happy to spook you
INDIAN actors in Hollywood productions certainly seem to be the flavour of the day. The newest export is actor Suchitra Pillai (Dil Chahta Hai, Fashion, Pyar ke Side Effects and memorable plays like Dance Like a Man) who will soon be seen in a full-fledged film produced by a big-ticket American studio. The film, a horror fest, is called The Other Side of the Door, and stars Sarah Wayne Callis (lead actor from Prison Break and Walking Dead) and Jeremy Sisto (Law and Order). Pillai plays the couple’s housekeeper and is among the three top actors in the film. “It’s set in Mumbai and it about an expat couple that lives here. I play their 70-year-old housekeeper,” smiles the 45-year-old. The film will release in the next few months and the studio has mega plans for its screenings—3,000 screens across the US alone.
Whoops!
WE seem to have bungled. Our picture yesterday of Aditya Parekh, son of HDFC’s Deepak Parekh, was of the wrong gentleman by the same name. The correct Aditya Parekh is pictured here, with his famous father. The younger Parekh married his girlfriend Mallika Tarkas in Mykonos, Greece, over the weekend, with 150 guests attending. We’re told it was a very small affair as Aditya, much unlike his father, is painfully low key.
Tailpiece
OUR favourite quicksilver-tongued minister Shashi Tharoor was at it again: regaling audiences with his humour and wit. The Congress leader and author was in conversation with Sunil Sethi at the Pune literature festival. Among other things, the two discussed his famous speech at the Oxford Union Society two months ago that won the politician much praise and even went viral on social media. Tharoor stated he couldn’t understand why this particular speech was so popular. “Because frankly, I’ve given so many better speeches,” he smiled. No, he doesn’t wear his modesty well.
Cricketer Suresh Raina at a promotional event in Juhu on Monday
Happy 50th
HIS Christmas parties at his Powai home, with a couple of thousand people attending, were legendary. But Mumbai’s favourite party boy has grown up. As this diarist had speculated a few weeks ago, Gautam Singhania did ring in his 50th birthday at a posh resort at Parwanoo, Himachal Pradesh, over the weekend. Along with him and wife Nawaz, were 60 of their oldest and closest friends. Many were Gautam’s pals from his school days at St Mary’s. Among others present were Aarti and Kailash Surendrenath, Shaina NC and Manish Munot, Jeh Wadia (without the beauteous Celina), Laila and Ricky Lamba, Priya Aswani and Farhad Taraporvala, Aparna and Milan Murjani and Perizaad Zorobian and husband Boman Irani. (Perizaad and Boman had kick-started the celebrations a week before, they hosted a lavish dinner for Gautam at their penthouse home in Bandra). One of the guests said they had a “fuss-free beautiful time” at the resort, where they “chilled and ate and stuffed ourselves like donkeys”. Farrokh Khambata did their catering honours.
Book my show
WE must confess to getting our cheap thrills from a cat fight, especially one that involves two grown hulking men. We are talking about the literary biff-pow between writer and impresario William Dalrymple and the talented and mercurial Aatish Taseer. And even though the events that you’re about to read of happened in July, details are just emerging on the Delhi grapevine. Dalrymple, who puts together the splendid Jaipur lit fest with Namita Gokhale, wrote to Aatish in mid-July inviting him to be part of a panel on the Partition and Manto, as Taseer has translated SH Manto’s work. The mail, which hints at past bad blood between the two men, is conciliatory in tone with Dalrymple saying, “I would be delighted if you would accept this offer in the reconciliatory spirit it was intended. It may well be that we are not destined to be friends, even if we share many friends and interests in common, but I don’t really see that either of us gain anything by continuing these pointless hostilities...” Aatish, unappeased and cut to the quick by the fact that his latest novel, The Way Things Were, finds no mention either in Dalrymple’s mail or at Jaipur, responds with a curt mail of his own. “Willy, even you must know that you don’t write to a writer in the week that he has published his most important work yet, and not so much as mention it. What is Manto compared to what I have achieved in The Way Things Were? Do you really believe that I don’t know the worth of my own work...Let me make this simple for you: go away and read my book. Then sit down and put in words your own admiration of it. After that I will gladly take seriously your invitation.” Phew.
Happy to spook you
INDIAN actors in Hollywood productions certainly seem to be the flavour of the day. The newest export is actor Suchitra Pillai (Dil Chahta Hai, Fashion, Pyar ke Side Effects and memorable plays like Dance Like a Man) who will soon be seen in a full-fledged film produced by a big-ticket American studio. The film, a horror fest, is called The Other Side of the Door, and stars Sarah Wayne Callis (lead actor from Prison Break and Walking Dead) and Jeremy Sisto (Law and Order). Pillai plays the couple’s housekeeper and is among the three top actors in the film. “It’s set in Mumbai and it about an expat couple that lives here. I play their 70-year-old housekeeper,” smiles the 45-year-old. The film will release in the next few months and the studio has mega plans for its screenings—3,000 screens across the US alone.
Whoops!
WE seem to have bungled. Our picture yesterday of Aditya Parekh, son of HDFC’s Deepak Parekh, was of the wrong gentleman by the same name. The correct Aditya Parekh is pictured here, with his famous father. The younger Parekh married his girlfriend Mallika Tarkas in Mykonos, Greece, over the weekend, with 150 guests attending. We’re told it was a very small affair as Aditya, much unlike his father, is painfully low key.
Tailpiece
OUR favourite quicksilver-tongued minister Shashi Tharoor was at it again: regaling audiences with his humour and wit. The Congress leader and author was in conversation with Sunil Sethi at the Pune literature festival. Among other things, the two discussed his famous speech at the Oxford Union Society two months ago that won the politician much praise and even went viral on social media. Tharoor stated he couldn’t understand why this particular speech was so popular. “Because frankly, I’ve given so many better speeches,” he smiled. No, he doesn’t wear his modesty well.
