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Scenes behind the screen
By Subhash K. Jha, Indo-Asian News Service

Mumbai, Jan 14 (IANS) There were loud cheers as Rani Mukherjee wrapped up a musical medley of her films in 2005 at the STAR Screen Awards, held in Mumbai. But when the show compere announced Akshay Kumar's name for 'best editor', not many in the audience appreciated the joke.
        

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One could see some invitees like Vipul Shah and his wife Shefali Shah (fresh from her triumphant performance on Aparna Sen's "15 Park Avenue") trying to look amused at the show Wednesday. Some tittered but most of the audience wondered when the actor had turned editor.

The joke, of course, was directed at Akshay's male co-stars from Suniel Shetty to John Abraham whose scenes Akshay has ostensibly cut.

But if there was an award for the flattest joke of the event, it should have gone to Akshay. 

The most unforgettable moments at the function, however, were off camera. 

There were separate tables devoted to various nominees' films, like the "Black" table which had the most reason to cheer at the end of the evening, having walked off with a majority of the awards including the best actor and actress.

The table next door for "Parineeta" seemed none too pleased. Director Vinod Chopra walked off right after he realized the big four awards weren't going to his film. 

Saif Aly Khan was at the 'Parineeta' table with ladylove Rosa and daughter Sarah who took time to go to the 'Black' table to chat up "Black" editor Bela Sehgal's two little daughters.

Sharmila Tagore later joined Saif and Rosa after giving away an award with Bengali actress Rituparna Sengupta (who, by the way, was announced by compere Diya Mirza as Mr Rituparna Sengupta). 

Sharmila left before the "Black" bang after politely shaking hands with Rosa. Maybe she had a headache.

Rekha sat in the front row, sandwiched between Farzana and Anil Kapoor. Hema Malini arrived fashionably late and left just as fashionably.

Amitabh Bachchan, who couldn't be at the function for obvious reasons, got a pleasant surprise when the entire "Black" team - Sanjay Leela Bhansali, Rani Mukherjee et all - came to his residence at Jalsa to share the triumph.

"I must say it was a touching moment when Sanjay and the 'Black' team came over after the awards," said Amitabh.

Not so touching was the delay caused by the lengthy and largely dreadful comic acts by the participants of "The Great Indian Laughter Challenge" who tried to make their presence felt.

There were so many numbers at the show that the awards underwent a time crunch. The final four - best actor, best actress, best director and best film - all went to "Black". And they all had to be rush-announced and accepted because the show had to close before 11 p.m.

Rani, who sat between her father and Sanjay Bhansali after her live act looked far from tense in a stunning figure-hugging sari.

Abhishek collected the trophy on his father's behalf. And also for his own performance in "Bunty Aur Babli". 

Tabu was seen giving soundbytes after the show. The compere asked what she thought of the evening's theme.

"What theme?" she wondered.

Precisely. 

Later Tabu and a group of friends were seen having dinner at the Saffron in J.W. Marriot.

The triumphant "Black" team was also at the Marriot's coffee shop. But that's another story.