Shalini Dore: Last News

Shalini Dore Features News Editor Smriti Mundhra, the creator of “Indian Matchmaking,” has launched a show called “The Romantics” on Netflix just in time for Valentine’s Day. The docuseries centers on a bastion of Hindi cinema, Yash Raj Films, which just released the smash hit “Pathaan.” Netflix releases the series day and date in India, the U.S. and around the world. And it is coming just as interest in films from the subcontinent are piquing international interest. “It was sort of on my bucket list to make something about Indian cinema, broadly,” she tells Variety. “The intention was to look at the formative, most iconic films in Indian cinema, or the filmmakers — something that gives a glimpse into our industry.”

Shalini Dore Features News Editor When last we saw the title character of Mani Ratnam’s epic “Ponniyin Selvan” saga, the real-life prince who would expand the Chola empire from South India all the way to the Ganges in the north was drowning as he crossed from Lanka to India. Instead of picking up at that cliffhanger, the action-packed second installment rewinds a few decades to focus on different characters, before circling back to reveal the fate of Jayam Ravi’s title character, also known as Arunmozhi Varman. “Ponniyin Selvan: Part Two” starts by filling in the backstory of how Arunmozhi’s older brother, Crown Prince Aditha Karikalan (Vikram), fell for Nandini (Aishwariya Rai Bachchan), an orphaned girl living with a priest family at the local temple. The royal family disapproved of him marrying a girl whose antecedents weren’t known, and so she was chased off. The story then picks up to when reports reach town that the younger prince has drowned.

Shalini Dore Features News Editor As the second season of Hulu’s “Taste the Nation” starts streaming May 5, executive producer and host Padma Lakshmi again takes viewers among the immigrant communities in the U.S. via their taste buds. Lakshmi spoke with Variety for AAPI Month ahead of the show’s season premiere. She says she and her team get lots of invitations from around the country asking them to visit and highlight the communities. This season they visit Puerto Rico, the Appalachians, the Afghan community in Washington, D.C., as well as Filipinos in the Bay Area. “We don’t just go into a community, visit them and we’re out and then rinse and repeat in the next town,” she says. “We’re looking at the larger issue of immigration in the country that is so integral to the foundation of our modern republic but also through the ever-evolving thing that is America. Immigration is so uniquely important to this country out of all the countries in the world and it’s what has made it its superpower.”

Shalini Dore Features News Editor Before there was “RRR,” director S.S. Rajamouli had box-office smashes like the two-part “Baahubali,” which proved how adept he is at making hits. But among Indian audiences, there is a deep divide between those who applaud that the rest of the world is waking up to his brilliance and those who are horrified that a “dubba” — or hollow film — is being lauded. I’ve heard it from my own Indian friends and relatives who have been reaching out to ask: what are they missing? Reports of viewers dancing at Hollywood’s iconic Chinese Theater to the Oscar-nominated song “Naatu Naatu” horrify these purists. But if you embrace what Rajamouli is doing, “Naatu Naatu” — which is not really the best song in Indian or Telegu films, or even in “RRR” — has somehow captured the zeitgeist, just as the film itself has. 

Shalini Dore Features News Editor Variety will present Nicolas Cage with the Variety Legend & Groundbreaker Award at the Miami Film Festival on March 5. Previous recipients of the prestigious award include Francis Ford Coppola, Hans Zimmer and Ron Howard. “Year after year, Nicolas Cage proves to be an actor of great range, exhibiting dramatic power and great comedic verve, making his work surprising, delightful and moving,” said Steven Gaydos, Variety EVP global content & executive editor. “We’re excited to see the Oscar-winner’s turn in Universal Pictures’ ‘Renfield’ this year and celebrate his entire career at the Miami Film Festival.” “Nicolas Cage is the very definition of a legend. An Academy Award-winning actor, a global superstar, and a cult icon, everyone the world over is familiar with his inimitable persona and larger than life presence,” said Lauren Cohen, Miami Film Festival Director of Programming. “He is truly one of a kind — the very essence of what we’re celebrating at our milestone 40th edition.”

Shalini Dore Features News Editor Filmmaker Mani Ratnam has taken on the epic task of adapting Tamil bestseller “Ponniyin Selvan” into two parts, the first of which released to excellent box office in India and overseas on Sept. 29. The film, with screenplay by Ratnam, Jayamohan and Kumaravel, is mostly faithful to Kalki Krishnamurthy’s five novels, the trio has streamlined the historical fiction first serialized in the 1950s in the Tamil magazine Kalki before being translated into multiple other languages, including English. They were based on the great ruler Raja Raja Chola (Chola, king of kings), who expanded his empire from modern-day Tamilnadu all the way north to the Ganges.

Shalini Dore Features News Editor The annual L.A. Phil Gala saluted composer John Williams on his 90th birthday Tuesday with the maestro conducting the orchestra on his “Violin Concerto No. 5.” Anne-Sophie Mutter made the violin sing as she performed on the premiere of his new piece. In his opening remarks on stage for the event, which marks the fall season opening for Walt Disney Concert Hall, L.A. Phil conductor Gustavo Dudamel said, “We have the chance tonight to celebrate one of the greatest composers of all time. His name is John Williams. He is a very special part of the Los Angeles Philharmonic family. His music for films transcends, it is in the big symphonic world like Mahler [and others].”

Shalini Dore Features News Editor As with so many other organizations these past couple of years, the Will Rogers Motion Picture Pioneers Foundation had been unable to meet in person. But on Wednesday, the charity, which provides assistance to theater workers, gathered at the Beverly Hilton to honor producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson as pioneers of the year. Presenting the award to the producers most famous for the James Bond franchise were Michelle Yeoh (“Tomorrow Never Dies”) and Daniel Craig, who starred as 007 in five of the films since 2006’s “Casino Royale.” “They just give and give, quietly and generously,” Craig said of Broccoli and Wilson’s philanthropic work. “They are like giving first responders. They see a problem and march right in.”

Shalini Dore Features News Editor As with so many western films, Bollywood has taken a beloved smash and turned it into a stage musical. Aditya Chopra’s “Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge” opened in 1995 and is still playing in a theater in Mumbai, India, still popular thanks to toe-tapping songs that grabbed audiences from the start and a charismatic lead pair (Shah Rukh Khan and Kajol). The film seems to have created a built-in audience for the stage version, “Come Fall in Love,” now playing its Old Globe premiere in San Diego on its way to Broadway. The opening overture (the film’s composers are replaced here by duo Vishal-Sheykhar) includes snippets of the Hindi hit. Moving the story from cold and gray London to cold and gray Boston, the tuner opens on Baldev (Irvine Iqbal) who runs a small shop catering to racists and jerks, seemingly. He is saving up money for a venture he and his partner have set up in India called Maharaja Tours.

Shalini Dore Features News Editor Smriti Mundhra cannot be pigeonholed into one oeuvre. The creator of Netflix’s popular “Indian Matchmaking,” which released its second season recently, directed two episodes of Mindy Kaling’s “Never Have I Ever” for the same streamer, and a segment of Brie Larson’s upcoming Disney+ docuseries “Growing Up.” Her “Shelter” doc short on homelessness is nominated for a news and documentary Emmy, as part of HBO Max series “Through Our Eyes.” Mundhra, whose father, Jagmohan, was also a filmmaker and ran the Culver City theater Meralta, took that name for her production company. “What I love about making films and this work is that it puts a human face on these kinds of big problems.”