Murdoch to star in JV with Birla

MUMBAI: With his ‘Star’ in the descendant, media mogul Rupert Murdoch is falling back on his oldest entertainment brand. On Wednesday, his movie company, 20th Century Fox, entered into a joint venture agreement with Kumarmangalam Birla’s Applause Entertainment to co-produce and distribute Indian language movies.
Company officials said the joint venture would initially produce a remake of ‘Phone Booth’, a recent Hollywood thriller released worldwide by 20th Century Fox, which was a success despite a limited release.
This is not the first business relationship between Mr Birla and Mr Murdoch. The A.V. Birla group chairman had decided to invest in Star News before making a sudden exit from the project.
When contacted, Anshuman Swamy, CEO of Applause Entertainment, refused to comment. However, Bollywood sources said Fox Entertainment was likely to co-produce movies with Applause Entertainment and would be the sole distributor in India and abroad.
Meanwhile, Applause Entertainment has roped in Sanjay Leela Bhansali of ‘Devdas’ fame to script and direct a movie christened ‘Black’ starring Amitabh Bachchan and Rani Mukherji. Mr Swamy said A.R. Rehman would score the music.
Although no official confirmation of the movie’s budget is available, sources estimate that it will be between Rs 12 crore and Rs 15 crore.
Mr Swamy said Applause Entertainment, a personal investment of Mr Birla, had also entered into joint venture agreement with the US-based Miracle Entertainment to co-produce movies.
As an initial step, the joint venture would produce a film called ‘Stamp Collector’, Mr Swamy said. The company has also signed an agreement with the Big B to produce a movie in 2004.