Mumbai — Bollywood’s favourite funny man Arshad Warsi is going to be a father again.
“Yup, the baby is due in May. I really want a girl this time. We’ve told our son Zeke it’s his baby. He believes the new baby is going to be his property,” Arshad told IANS.
Arshad is sporting a new hairstyle.
“My hair was becoming too long and I needed to take a hair cut for my next film ‘Goal’. The director Vivek Agnihotri wanted me to keep it shorter.”
A Parsi lady called Sambo does Arshad’s clothes. And when the makers of “Goal” suggested another stylist, Arshad put his foot down.
“I know only Sambo makes me look good,” he said.
Arshad, who recently wound up Sony TV’s reality show “Bigg Boss”, was stationed in Karjat on the outskirts of Mumbai for a week before the grand finale on Jan 27.
“I was shooting for ‘Bigg Boss’. And I also shot the promo for the third part of ‘Munnabhai’. Ralph Fiennes had come with Vidhu Vinod Chopra to watch us shoot the promo. He isn’t just a fine actor but also a truly humble and decent man. I haven’t met anyone so modest.”
Looking back on the “Bigg Boss” experience, Arshad feels nothing but a sense of pleasure.
“I took it up because it was a good concept, opportunity and money. But I never thought I’d care a hoot about those 13 people living in the house. Every Friday I looked forward to meeting them on eviction day. And they did too. All of us felt so good. I was never mean to them.
“Would I do ‘Bigg Boss’ again? Yes, I would. Let’s see if they’ve a second season. Though I’ll be going a little easy on television in the near future.”
Arshad spoke to the “Bigg Boss” inmates from a script.
“Most of it was scripted. But I did improvise, especially when the contestants did something unusual… like Anupama Verma pouring her heart out at the finale. When these guys broke down in front of me, it was traumatic… and a responsibility.
“When Amit Sadh broke down I made sure a psychiatrist was sent there. Some of it was truly heart-rending… like Carol Gracias and Rahul Roy – after Ravi Kishen’s eviction they sat the entire day all dressed up. I’d peep in to ask them if they were okay. I could see their state of mind. They were messed up.”
And did Arshad actually get paid Rs.90 lakh for hosting “Bigg Boss”?
“If you’re talking about just the finale then that’s rubbish. But if you’re asking me about the sum paid for the entire season of ‘Bigg Boss’, then it’s a lot more money… More importantly I got a lot of compliments for ‘Bigg Boss’. But I’m still not comfortable with compliments.”