We get celebrities to recommend their favourite films, TV shows, live performances and food for you, our readers.
Aftab Shivdasani
Aftab Shivdasani
Favourite film: The Last Samurai
I love the film and the story. I can’t find a single flaw in the film and this is one of my favourite films. It released in the early 2000’s and I saw it in the theatre and was floored by it. I cried while watching the film and once I cry I know there is something special about it. The story is about Tom Cruise going to Japan and fighting a war, first against the Japanese and later he gets attached to the Japanese culture and falls in love there and then he fights for the Japanese against his own country; it’s a beautiful story.
Aftab is an actor
Anusha Mani
Favourite album: Roja by A.R. Rahman
This album was a breath of fresh air. At a time when no one in the industry was experimenting with sounds and production, Rahman brought something spectacular. It changed the way I looked at music. The compositions still take me to a world of trance. The perfect combination of brilliant composition and extraordinary music production is the reason why Roja will be my all time favourite album. Songs like Dil Hai Chhota Sa are sung even today and loved as much. Yeh Haseen Waadiyan takes you to Kashmir even if you don’t see the visuals. That’s the power of his music. Bharat Humko was sung by me in my college days for events all the time. The beauty of doing raag based compositions in a contemporary style is what sets the album and composer apart from everyone else.
— Anusha is a vocalist
Ramanjit Kaur
Favourite play: The Legend of Khasak
The Legend of Khasak by Deepan Sivaraman, based on O.V. Vijayan’s masterpiece, designed and performed at Trikkaripur, Kerala was an intense experience on many levels. The long, solitary and adventurous journey from Kolkata to Mumbai to Mangalore to Payannur to finally Trikkaripur, was worth it. The venue of the performance was a huge piece of land, surrounded by dense old banyan trees, with the audience seated on three sides of the performance space. Deepan has captured the essence of the legend through haunting images, intense moments, brilliant technical design. Adding to this whole magic was the haunting and layered music by theatre musician Chandran Veyattummal. I just fell in love with his music.
Ramanjit is a theatre actor
Kshama Prabhu
Favourite cuisine: Korean and Vietnamese
I remember the first time I tried Korean and Vietnamese food. The intoxicating aromas, bright colours and great looking dishes were instantly captivating. I had gone for a holiday back in 2012 to Australia where I first tried these cuisines. They were among the best meals of my life! Being a chef, I am always curious to try new food and learn more about global cuisines. Korean and Vietnamese cuisines use a lot of fresh produce and have some bold flavours that Indians can relate to. And both the cuisines have some unique dishes everyone should try.
Kshama is a chef
Murzban F. Shroff
Favourite book: Humboldt’s Gift
Every once in a while comes a book that is so exquisitely written, that is so rich in human insights, that you want to savour it one page at a time. Humboldt’s Gift by Saul Bellow is one such book. Tracing the life of Charlie Citrine, an award-winning playwright facing an all-time low in his personal and professional life, Bellow examines the polar dynamics of success and failure, of lives thwarted by expectation, dissolution, and envy, and he does so in the fashion of “a man keenly aware of the painted veils, of Maya.” Even as Charlie grapples with his mounting troubles — a bitter divorce, greedy lawyers, an unforgiving judge, a self-serving shrink, and a neurotic mafia goon — he draws strength from the memories of his old friend and mentor, the late poet, Humboldt, who “speaks to him from the grave.” But Humboldt is just an excuse for Bellow to reflect on the larger questions of life, which he does by drawing on a store of knowledge that brings us the best of literature, philosophy, psychology, and metaphysics. For those to whom reading is more than entertainment, a raising of consciousness, the book has insights such as: “Love is a standing debt of the soul” and “Under pressure of a public crisis the private sphere is being surrendered.” Which is presciently and ominously true in the age of social media.
Murzban is a writer
Samir Kochhar
Favourite T.V. show: Game Of Thrones
It used to be LOST for the longest time till Game Of Thrones came along. Like a hardcore GoT fan would say, you never know who’s going to die next and it’s best not to have a favourite character on this show since he or she will be killed in the nastiest way possible! Game Of Thrones is the most vicious TV show I have ever seen. It has got everything you would get addicted to — a brilliant plot, characters that are so clever that you even end up loving the villainous ones like Cersei Lannister and Ramsay Snow as well and locations that are so mind-blowing they are on my next travel bucket list. Waiting for Season 6 to start and tear my heart out with a vengeance! All hail George R.R. Martin!
Samir is a television host
Compiled by Aarti Bhanushali and Julie Sam
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( Source : deccan chronicle )
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