Hooray for Bollywood

The Subcontinent's Stars Light Up Trump's Taj Mahal

Rani Mukherjee accepts her best actress Bollywood Award at the Trump Taj Mahal Casino in Atlantic City.( - FOR THE WASHINGTON POST)

ATLANTIC CITY -- The thousands of fans gathered here for the annual Bollywood Awards knew a glimpse was all they might get of star Rani Mukherjee.

But those who conned their way backstage Saturday night had higher hopes. Sure, her makeup artist sometimes acts as a bodyguard, and the actress commands upward of six figures -- high by Indian standards -- per film, stage appearance or Pepsi commercial. Still, for her expatriate brethren, perhaps she'd offer a smile, an autograph, a touch of her lime-green sari?

Even a Broadway star came armed with a pickup line, hoping to meet her.

"Our horoscopes match," said Manu Narayan, the leading man in the short-lived "Bombay Dreams." "She just doesn't know it yet."

But as Narayan obliged his own fans' requests for photos and autographs, Mukherjee stayed sequestered in her dressing room, as many as a half-dozen handlers guarding the door. She emerged to receive an award for best supporting actress, and then again to present David Hasselhoff -- yes, the one who bared his soul and more on "Baywatch" in a way that would draw the ire of Bollywood censors -- with the International Star of the Year award. But everyone here knew this David was no match for Mukherjee, the Goliath of the evening.

Mukherjee came out again to collect her statue for best actress and, last, for a 12-minute dance finale. But each time, she darted back to her room flanked by one man juggling her trophy or her bottled water and two others flailing their arms to keep the hordes from rubbing elbows, shoulders or anything else with the woman who has starred in roughly three dozen movies in her 27 years.

Such were the theatrics at the seventh Bollywood Awards, staged aptly enough at the Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort. Just steps away from the whirring of roulette wheels and bleeping of slot machines under mirrored ceilings and ornate domes, a sellout audience of 5,500 clapped and cheered for their own garish, escapist dramas. Many confessed they cared little about the actual awards but had paid between $35 and $200 for tickets to see their favorite actors dance and lip-sync to Bollywood soundtracks.

India churns out about 900 films per year, and about a quarter of those movies -- mostly Hindi musicals -- are lumped into the category known as Bollywood. (The industry's epicenter, once known as Bombay, is now called Mumbai.) Bollywood films tend to be long musicals (three hours or more) and the story lines are predictable and simple: Boy meets girl, loses girl and fights obstacles from caste to competition to win her back. Along the way, in good times and bad, boy and girl -- and everyone else -- frequently burst into song.

Bollywood flicks are no longer relegated to ethnic grocery stores, fuzzy pirated videos teetering on racks between cumin powder and frozen samosas. They are increasingly available at Blockbuster and through Netflix, the online movie rental service. Comcast has started Bollywood on Demand as one of its digital cable offerings in the Washington region. And though it flopped, "Bride and Prejudice," an Indian adaptation of the Jane Austen novel, attempted to marry Hollywood with Bollywood as song-and-dance numbers interrupt an almost-entirely English script.

Yet for the faithful who gathered here, Bollywood is no passing fancy that will fade as quickly as Madonna's henna tattoos. It represents an intense, nostalgic connection to home, no matter how many times removed.

That's what made Ameela Rasul, 6 1/2 months pregnant, cram into a car with five other relatives from Queens for the four-hour drive. She emigrated from Guyana 12 years ago and can't speak Hindi, so she scrutinizes both the subtitles and landscapes of Bollywood to better understand her roots.

"Our forefathers were Indian," said the stay-at-home mother as she pushed to the front of a line for tickets. "So, sure, we are Indian."