When Madhubala was so fascinated by Shammi Kapoor's dance, she forgot to Act

 

Shammi Kapoor and Madhubala acted in 3 films together. It was in their third film 'Boy Friend' released in 1961, there was a song to be picturized on Shammi Kapoor and Madhubala. The situation of the song was that Madhubala is sleeping and Shammi Kapoor has to sing a song. She was supposed to be asleep in the sequence but she couldn't close her eyes, she was so fascinated by the style of steps Shammi Kapoor taking. The Director picturized the song as she would keep one eye open as he serenaded her.

This happened during the picturization of the song 'Dheere Chal Dheere Chal Aye Bheegi Hawa' from 'Boy Friend'. This film song was shot after the success of Yahoo song and Shammi Kapoor was a superstar now. This film was the twentieth highest-grossing Indian film of 1961.

Song of Boy Friend 1961

Boy Friend was produced and directed by Naresh Saigal. The film stars Madhubala, Shammi Kapoor and Dharmendra. The film's music was by Shankar Jaikishan.It was a remake of the first blockbuster film of India 'Kismet' released in 1943 starring Ashok Kumar.

A Still from  Rail Ka Dibba 1953

Shammi Kapoor and Madhubala came together in Rail Ka Dibba released in 1953. Though Shammi had signed on Jeevan Jyoti first, P N Arora's Rail Ka Dibba had gone on the floor ahead of it, as if it was ordained that his career should start with Madhubala. Before this  Shammi had signed was his friend Aspi Irani's Hum Tum Aur Woh opposite Madhubala. But that film didn't go beyond the opening shot.

After Rail Ka Dibba both worked together in Lekhraj Bhakri's Naqab (1955), this film also was not successful. In fact, Shammi Kapoor became a star in 1957 with the hit film 'Tumsa Nahin Dekha'

A Still from Naqab 1955

After Junglee Shammi Kapoor became a star and gave many hits after this film.It definitely not one of his best movies either but entertaining enough to keep one glued to his/her seat esp if you are a Shammi Kapoor fan.

Songs of Boy Friend 1961

Songs of Boy Friend 1961

60 Years of Mughal E Azam

The Filmfare reviewed Mughal-E -Azam at the time of its release on 5th Aug 1960, it is a  tribute to the imagination, conviction, hard work, and lavishness of an extraordinary filmmaker K Asif. 
The development of Mughal-e-Azam began in 1944 when Asif read a play set in the reign of Emperor Akbar He got a financer/producer Shiraz Ali Hakeem to make the movie. K Asif cast Chandra Mohan, D.K. Sapru, and Nargis for the roles of Akbar, Salim, and Anarkali, respectively..Shooting started in 1946 in Bombay Talkies studio. It is said four reels were shot. The political tensions and communal rioting surrounding India's 1947 partition and independence stalled production. Shortly after partition, Shiraz Ali migrated to Pakistan, leaving Asif without a financier. 

The actor Chandra Mohan suffered a heart attack and died in 1949. Shiraz Ali had previously suggested that business tycoon Shapoorji Pallonji could finance the film. Although Pallonji knew nothing about film production, in 1950 he agreed to produce the film because of his interest in the history of Akbar. Production was then restarted with a new cast. Initially, K Asif rejected Dilip Kumar for the part of Prince Salim as he was too slim but later signed him for the role. For Akbar, the name of Prithviraj Kapoor was recommended by Shapoorji, and for the role of Anarkali the name of Suraiya was chosen but she refused the film. Ultimately Madhubala was signed for this role. 

In 1952 K Asif began the shooting with the new cast. The music director now was Naushad, earlier it was Anil Biswas. Asif wanted to make the film on a grand scale, each set took 8 to 9 months to complete. It took 7 years to complete the film. Shahpoorji had full faith on Asif, he kept on pouring money for this film. Those days a normal film used to have a budget if 12-15 Lakh but this film was made on a budget of 1.5 crore rupees.
The film was sold for an astounding amount of 1.7 million per territory at a time when a big film used to be sold at 3 to 5 lakh per territory. There was a great euphoria related to this film. A grand premiere of this film was organized at Maratha Mandir theatre in Bombay'.All the top celebrities attended the premiere.   In sync with the grandeur of the era, the film had set out to capture, invitations designed as a royal scroll and titled “ Akbarnama” were sent out to “command” the guests to arrive at the grand opening of the film.

. The film had an all-India release in 150 theatres simultaneously. This was a stupendous feat in those days. The film opened to largely positive reviews. It had captured the imagination of the viewers with its lavish scale, excellent performances, immortal dialogues, and soulful music. The film made a record collection 0f rupees 4 million by way of advance booking for the first week in Bombay only. Audiences queued up in front of theatres to see the film. Many stood and lived outside the theater for days. The demand for tickets of the
film forced the management to close ticket bookings for three weeks, “something that had never happened before—or since”.A rupees 1.30 ticket was sold in black for an amount as high as 200/-. Newspapers widely reported the success of the film and the mass hysteria amongst the audience. 
 Mughal-e-Azam became a mega-success and collected sales amounting to 35 million. It ran houseful in Maratha Mandir for three years, a record for Indian cinema which was broken after 15 years by Sholay in 1975.
Mughal-e-Azam garnered the position of a celluloid monument. On November 12, 2004, the film was re-released after fully coloring in theaters across India and history was all set to repeat itself.

Premiere of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Seene Mein Sulagte Hain Armaan - An Immortal Song

The writer of this immortal song was Prem Dhawan. It was composed by Anil Biswas and sung by Talat Mehmood and Lata Mangeshkar. Anil Biswas composed the tune of this song in just 15 minutes while riding in a car.
There was a rumor that the lyrics had been bought from Sahir Ludhianvi for Rs 5/-, as Sahir was in need of money, and Prem Dhawan had helped him. It is very sad that Prem Dhawan was always underrated. He was multitalented, he was a composer beside lyricist and as well as a Choreographer.and also acted in a few films.
He wrote songs like Mera Rag De Basanti Chola, Ae Watan Ai Watan from Shaheed, and many more songs. He won the National Film Award for Best Lyrics in 1971 for the film, Nanak Dukhiya Sub Sansar

This song was picturized on Dilip Kumar and Madhubala for the film Tarana released in 1951. This was the first film of Dilip Kumar and Madhubala together. Regarding this song, Shikha Biswas Vohra, daughter of music director Anil Biswas said in an interview that how her father composed this song. Prem Dhawan and her father were good friends, they were booked for two films Tarana and Arman in 1950. One day Prem Dhawan gave him few lines of this song and asked him to make the tune while going to meet the famous Punjabi singer Surinder Kaur On reaching.the destination Anil Biswas asked Prem Dhawan to go to meet the singer and he sat on the parapet and started humming the tune. By the time Prem Dhawan returned, the tune was ready.
Interestingly the song was a sad song but Anil Biswas used the major scale and another point to highlight that he used three different tunes for the three Antaras. A very rare occurrence and only a genius like Anil Biswas could do that. Madan Mohan also did the same in many songs later.in the 60s.If we look technically the use of Teevra 'Ma'gives it the feeling of Raga Yaman Kalyan.
This is probably one of the greatest duets of Bollywood. Everything is perfect, lyrics, music, singing, and picturization on two of the greatest actors Dilip Kumar and Madhubala.

Song of Tarana 1951

A Journey from Baby Mumtaz to Madhubala

Madhubala (14th Feb 1933 – 23 February 1969 ) started acting at the age of seven and made her first film for Bombay Talkies, where she had to sing a song – ‘Mere chhote se man me, chhoti si duniya re’. She was called Baby Mumtaz. She worked as Baby Mumtaz in many films such as Pujari, Phoolwari, and Rajputani.
She was spotted by Kidar Sharma and paired her as heroine opposite Raj Kapoor in Neel Kamal(1947). She was barely 14 years old and he named her Madhubala.
A couple of years later, Kamal Amrohi cast her opposite Ashok Kumar in Mahal and a star was born. She became everyone’s darling and the industry crowned her ‘Venus of the Indian Screen’, She was now the preferred heroine of Dilip Kumar and Dev Anand.

Madhubala as Baby Mumtaz

 Her first film with Dilip Kumar was Tarana. They went on to do three more – Sangdil, Amar and Mughal-e-Azam. The latter was also her last film before she was bedridden. 
With Dev Anand, she worked in 6 films. The first film they did together was" Nirala "released in 1950, the other films were  Aaram (1951), Naadan (1951), Kala Pani (1958), Jaali Note (1960), and Sharabi (1964)
During the career span of 22 years, she appeared in around 73 Hindi films. She worked with all the leading heroes of their time. Madhubala's co-stars Ashok Kumar, Raj Kapoor, Rehman, Pradeep Kumar, Shammi Kapoor, Dilip Kumar, Sunil Dutt, and Dev Anand were the most popular actors of that period. She also appeared with notable leading ladies such as Kamini Kaushal, Suraiya, Geeta Bali, Nalini Jaywant, Shyama and Nimmi. The directors she worked with, Mehboob Khan (Amar), Guru Dutt (Mr. & Mrs. '55), Kamal Amrohi (Mahal) and K. Asif (Mughal-e-Azam), were amongst the most prolific and respected. Madhubala also became a producer and produced films like Naata (1955) and Mahlon Ke Khwab (1960) and acted in both the films.
Madhubala gave a flamboyant performance in Guru Dutt's satire Mr. & Mrs. '55 (1955). The film revolves around Anita, a wealthy heiress, and a struggling cartoonist, Pritam (Guru Dutt). Mr. & Mrs. '55 has hit songs, "Jaane Kahan Mera Jigar Gaya Jee" (a duet sung by Geeta Dutt and Mohammed Rafi) and "Thandi Hawa Kali Ghata" (sung by Geeta Dutt). Mr. & Mrs. 55 was the fifth highest-grossing film of that year. She also acted in costume dramas such as Shirin-Farhad (1956), Raj-Hath (1956) (both with Pradeep Kumar).^] Dhake Ki Malmal was a romantic musical comedy directed by J.K. Nanda and produced under the Nanda Film banners. The film starred Madhubala and Kishore Kumar together for the first time. Both of them later acted in several popular "musical comedies" such as Chalti Ka Naam Gaadi (1958), Jhumroo (1961) and Half Ticket (1962).
The love with Dilip Kumar is well known but they couldn't marry. Madhubala met Kishore Kumar during the shooting of Dhake Ki Malmal (1956). In 1960, Madhubala married him when she was 27 years old. When Madhubala was ill in the late 1950s with the congenital heart disease, Kishore Kumar proposed to her and she decided to marry him after realizing that Dilip Kumar was not going to marry her.
Madhubala had a ventricular septal defect (a hole in her heart) In 1969, she was set to make her directorial debut with the film Farz aur Ishq. However, the film was never made, as during pre-production, she died on 23 February 1969, shortly after her 36th birthday. The cause of death was determined to be the prolonged lung and heart illness

Mere chhote se man me -sung by Madhubala as a child in  Basant 1942

Song of Neel Kamal 1947

Song of Mahal 1949

Song of Tarana 1950

Song of Nirala 1950

Song of Mr. & Mrs. '55 (1955)

Song of Kala Pani 1958

Song of Howrah Bridge 1958

Song of Chalti Ka Naam Gaadi 1958

Song of Mughal e Azam 1960

Song of Barsaat Ki Raat 1960

History behind the historical -MUGHAL_E_AZAM

K.Asif first launched this film in 1944 with financier Shiraz Ali, casting Sapru, Chandramohan and Nargis in the roles later done by Prithviraj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar and Madhubala. But Shiraz's migration to Pakistan after Partition, the communally-sensitive atmosphere after Independence and finally Chandramohan's death in 1949 made him drop the project.
K Asif wanted to start the project once again in 1951 but no financier was interested in this film. It was Shapoorji Pallonji, the construction magnate, came on board in 1951. K Asif was interested to make this film in colour but the financier refused to finance further. Ultimately he did so in the song Pyar kiya to darna kya and the climax. The film was finally completed at a cost of about Rs 1.5 crore in 1960. 
Asif had planned to make Mughal-e-Azam in three languages - Hindi, Tamil and English. While the Hindi version became a super hit, the Tamil-dubbed version came a cropper at the box-office and he subsequently dropped the idea of dubbing it in English in the voices of British actors.
For the picturization of the song, Pyar kiya to darna kya a grand set of Sheesh Mahal was constructed. The grandeur was incomparable: the mirrors for the dance sequence on the Sheesh Mahal set were coated with a thin, transparent wax layer to prevent reflection from studio lights. The set was 80 feet wide and 150 feet long - and 35 feet high. And cinematographer R.D.Mathur would sometimes take up to eight hours to light a single shot! Sometimes, 14 cameras were used when the norm then was just one or two, and unlike the normal 60 to 125 shooting days, MEA thus needed 500, with more than a million feet of negative being used.

The song Pyar kiya to darna kya costed Rs 10 lakh to shoot, which was equal to the production cost of a big film! This Lata chartbuster's graph was perfected by Naushad and Shakeel in a marathon session from four in the evening to daybreak the following day on the terrace of Naushad's bungalow. Neither ate food during this period.
Music director Naushad composed many more than the 12 songs finally seen in the film, and Lata Mangeshkar sang eight solos and the duet Teri mehfil mein with Shamshad Begum. The hits were led by Mohe panghat pe and Mohabbat ki jhoothi kahani.
For Rafi's song Ae mohabbat zindabad a chorus of 100 singers were used.K Asif wanted 2 songs to be sung by Bade Ghulam Ali khan. Since Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan did not want to sing for films and quoted an exorbitant sum to discourage Naushad and Asif, they agreed to the sum (in multiples of the topmost playback singer's fees) and the maestro had no choice but to render Shubh din aayo and Prem jogan banke as he had no excuse left!

The war sequences used 2000 camels, 4000 horses and 8000 men, most of the latter being real soldiers from the Army. Prithviraj wore real armour, real weapons were crafted and real jewellery used. The best tailors, embroiders, jewellers, shoemakers and other craftsmen from across the country were employed. The chains worn by Madhubala in prison were also real. Even the statue of Lord Krishna was in real gold.
Tailors were brought from Delhi to stitch the costumes, specialists from Surat were hired to do the embroidery, goldsmiths from Hyderabad designed jewellery, craftsmen from Kolhapur worked on the crowns, ironsmiths from Rajasthan made the weaponry and shoemakers from Agra produced the royal footwear.
When completed, Asif is said to have got Rs 17 lakh per territory for the film when the going rate was Rs 3-4 lakh. The premiere invite was written in Urdu on red velvet and "stamped" with the seal of Akbar's royal court.

The premiere of Mughal-e-Azam was held at the then new,1,100-capacity Maratha Mandir cinema in Mumbai, The day before bookings for the film opened, a reported crowd of 100,000 gathered outside the Maratha Mandir to buy tickets. The tickets, the most expensive for a Bollywood film at that time, were dockets containing text, photographs and trivia about the film, and are now considered collector's items

This premiere was shown as a live event in Navketan's film Kala Bazar where Dev Anand does black marketing of the premiere shows tickets.
 The film ran for 100 weeks, was the biggest grosser of the 1960s and was finally beaten by the 1975 Sholay.
There had been three screen versions of the same story earlier also. Two starred one of Indian cinema’s top female stars, Sulochana, as Anarkali – in 1928 as a silent feature and then in 1935 as a talkie.

Madhubala- A Journey from Baby Mumtaz to Madhubala

Madhubala (February 14, 1933 - February 23, 1969) the woman who was born on Valentine's Day as Mumtaz Jehan Begum in Delhi. She was one of the five children in the family. At the age of 9, she became the bread earner of the family. She was signed in for the film Basant in 1942 as a child artist as Baby Mumtaz.In this film, she sang two songs and one of them " Mere Chhote Se Mun Mein Chhoti Si Duniya Re "became immensely popular and got many films as a child artist.
 Actress Devika Rani was impressed by her performances and potential and advised her to assume the name Madhubala. At the age of 14 she got her first film as a heroine opposite Raj Kapoor who was debuting as a hero in the 1947 film" Neel Kamal"In this film her screen name was Madhubala. The film was not a commercial success, but her performance was received well. It was only a matter of time that Madhubala shot to fame and her work in the 1949 film Mahal got her the success she rightfully deserved. She was just 16.

Baby Mumtaz(Madhubala) in Basant 1942

As Baby Mumtaz, she worked in 5 films, Basant(1942) was her first film but her second film " Dhanna Bhagat" came after 3 years in 1945.. In 1946, her 3 films got released. Pujari released first in this film also she sang a song, the next release was "Phoolwari". It was the third highest grossing Indian film of 1946. The film was directed by Chaturbhuj Doshi for Ranjit Studios and is cited as one of the important films of actor Motilal. The third film of that year was Rajputani.

Madhubala in Neel Kamal 1947

Her first film as Madhubala was Neel Kamal which was released in 1947. The next year, she starred in a number of films, namely ‘Parai Aag’, ‘Lal Dupatta’, ‘Desh Sewa’ and ‘Amar Prem’. However, none of them did much to promote her career as an actress, in fact, she appeared in 12 films after Neel Kamal none of the films clicked in Box Office.
It was in the year 1949 that success finally came Madhubala’s way. She starred in Bombay Talkies production, ‘Mahal’, opposite seasoned actor Ashok Kumar. The film went on to become a major success and established her as a star. She was applauded not only for her talent, but also for her enigmatic screen presence and beauty. Following ‘Mahal’, Madhubala was seen in a number of successful films.

Madhubala in Mahal 1949

After Mahal, Madhubala's film Dulari was released the same year that stars Madhubala, Geeta Bali, Shyam, Jayant and Suresh. The song has the hit song "Suhani Raat Dhal Chuki" sung by Mohammed Rafi and featuring Suresh. Dulari was the year's eighth-highest-grossing.

Madhubala in Mughal-e-Azam 1960

During the career span of 22 years, Madhubala was known for her roles in more than 70 films of variety of genres such as Mahal (1949), Dulari (1949), Beqasoor (1950), Tarana (1951), Amar (1954), Mr. & Mrs. '55 (1955), Chalti Ka Naam Gaadi (1958), Howrah Bridge (1958) and Mughal-e-Azam (1960) with actors such as Dilip Kumar, Guru Dutt, Ashok Kumar, Dev Anand, Kishore Kumar and many more as her co-stars. Out of 73 Hindi films, only fifteen of them were successful at box office. She received her only nomination for a Filmfare Award for Best Actress for her performance in Mughal-e-Azam (1960).
Madhubala had a long relationship with actor Dilip Kumar, but instead, she married her Chalti Ka Naam Gaadico-star Kishore Kumar in 1960. Together they had worked in films such as Dhake Ki Malmal (1956), Chalti Ka Naam Gaadi (1958), Jhumroo (1961), Half Ticket(1962). Madhubala's life and career were cut short when she died on 23 February 1969 from a prolonged illness at the age of 36 thus ends the journey of Madhubala.
Madhubala is, by far, the most iconic silver screen goddess India has produced.

Watch Madhubala as Baby Mumtaz singing in her own voice 

Song of Basant 1942

Song of Neel Kamal 1947

Song of Mahal 1949

Song of Dulari 1949

Song from Tarana 1951

Song from Mr &Mrs 55 1955

Song from Phagun 1958

Song from Kala Paani 1958

Song from Howrah Bridge 1958

Song from Chalti Ka Naam Gaadi  1958

Song from Barsaat Ki Raat  1960

Song from Mughal-e-Azam  1960