Mumbai, Feb 17: Bollywood actress Preity Zinta today said people find it difficult to digest that she is the boss of an IPL cricket team.
"Even after a year, I am asked whether I am a co-owner as a girlfriend or got a gift from my father. I have invested my ten years` savings in the team and my partners (beau Ness Wadia and co-owner Mohit Burman) treat me equally," Preity said speaking at a seminar "Is the Indian Media and Entertainment Industry A Male Bastion" at the 10th FICCI-FRAMES conference here.
The actress said the women of today were competitive across the board and were not asking for preferential treatment.
To a question whether she felt offended when described as the only `man` in the industry when she deposed as a witness in a Bollywood-underworld nexus case, Preity said she did.
"I had told people to applaud me as a woman and not a man," she said adding that in cricket she was not considered a male but as a female romantically linked to certain members of her team. "It is disgusting," Preity said.
On her films, Preity said she had portrayed the role of a successful career woman in `Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna`, an unwed mother in `Kya Kehna` and a successful media personality in `Lakshya`.
"I have ensured that my characters have not become successful through wrong means because I firmly believe that audiences ape films," she said.
Actress Poonam Dhillon said Indian cinema was ahead of Hollywood in terms of having more number of women directors.
"But we are still at an infant stage. Women directors make women-oriented films and are slotted to niche audience areas. But Farah Khan and now Zoya Akhtar have brought about a change in the perspective with which women filmmakers are looked at," she said.
She felt actresses today have more opportunities than the time when she was a heroine.
Television producer Anuradha Prasad said television content was driven by TRPs.
"Kumkum gets more TRPs for me than my earlier shows like Rihai and Haqeeqat," she said replying to a question on why television content was so regressive in present times as compared to shows like `Rajni` and `Udaan` in the 1980s depicting successful, independent women.
In another seminar, `Cut, Paste and Copy to Indian Taste: Films in India`, filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt said the need of the hour was to demystify the word `originality`.
There is a difference between copying films scene-by -scene and adapting good work of other filmmakers and weaving your own inputs to "create a fresh content".
"I do not understand why anyone should have a problem with people indulging in cut, paste and copy if they get audiences and their copied films are successful at the box office," he said adding one needs brains even to copy someone else`s film sensibly.
Filmmaker Kabir Khan wondered why anybody questions a cut, copy and paste film if it was a huge success.
"There are no brownie points for originality. If an original film fails at the box office, nobody appreciates a good effort," he said.
Echoing him, filmmaker Imtiaz Ali said if there is power in being original then it should pay you back.
Director of films `Khosla Ka Ghosla`, and `Oye Lucky Lucky Oye`, Dibakar Banerjee said there was a difference between cut, paste and copy films and legally adapting novels into films and taking inspiration from incidents which have been reported in newspapers.
Bureau Report
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