MUMBAI: Tennis is and will remain Mahesh Bhupati’s second love, his wife Lara Dutta being the first! Bhupati can’t understand the fuss about his supposed acting debut in Lara’s production Chalo Dilli.
Speaking to Businessofcinema.com, Bhupati says, “When you see the film you’ll be surprised. I really don’t have any acting ambitions. I have been, and I remain, taken up with tennis. I’ve had acting offers in the past. I wouldn’t say many, but yes, a few. But I never got around to doing any acting.”
Now Bhupati has no intentions of getting in front of the camera. Shooting down reports that he plans to make his full-fledged acting debut in adrama-thriller to be directed by Shashant Shah, the tennis ace says, “I have absolutely no plans of turning an actor. I don’t know where these rumours come from. But yes I am producing films. My banner is called Big Daddy Productions and all my free time is taken up in finding the script worth producing.”
When he isn’t playing tennis Bhupati is busy combing through scripts. “After we found Challo Dilli’s wonderful script for my wife to produce, I’ve gone through approximately 40 scripts. I’ve finally zeroed in on the script that I want to produce. All I can tell you at the moment is I am not acting in it. I admit that sports and cinema are closely related in this country but I think I am best left on the tennis field. I will just produce films. I’ll leave the acting to others who know their job.”
Bhupati also shoots down the possibility of his wife being part of every film he produces. “She doesn’t have to act in every film I produce. She has her own production house Bheegi Basanti to look after while I’ve my own. We’ll be producing films separately.”
Remind him that his wife is upset about the fact that he blurted out his presence in Challo Dilli and he promptly quips, “Oh, she’ll get over it.”
