Life has come a full circle for Sanjay Leela Bhansali. 16 years after he started his career in cinema directing the songs for Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s 1942: A Love Story, he has once again choreographed an entire song in his forthcoming Hrithik Roshan-Aishwarya Bachchan starrer Guzaarish.

While he did provide inputs through a vital step here and a pirouette there in his various films, Bhansali has never fully choreographed a number in any of his earlier films, which had pivotal dance scenes.

Incidentally, Bhansali has also turned into a full-fledged music composer for Guzaarish. While he became a music composer by design, choreography happened by accident.

A source close to the director says, “It happened last week while he was shooting a dance sequence with Aishwarya. Sanjay wanted her to do an impromptu and spontaneous dance. Sanjay wanted it to look as if Aishwarya was not dancing for the camera.”

But the movements that the choreographer showed them were somehow not working out. Sanjay found the whole effect too rehearsed and premeditated.


The source adds, “Time was running out so Sanjay finally decided to take matters into his own hands. Since he is also the film’s music composer, he understood the song’s core rhythm and soon began demonstrating the steps to Aishwarya. Everyone eventually suggested that he choreograph the entire song. Within four hours the song was done.”

The director says, “In the course of a film one often encounters any number of hurdles. It’s a director’s job to be equipped to handle any eventuality on the sets. Actors often get stuck in situations that they can’t get out of on their own. It’s the director’s job to guide them. That’s all I did.”

The handful of people who have watched the rushes of Guzaarish Dance Of Life (the song’s unofficial title) say it’s one of Aishwarya’s most brilliantly choreographed and executed dance numbers ever.

Now that Bhansali, a devotee and follower of the Kathak exponent Pandit Birju Maharaj, has reconnected with his love for choreography, he is seriously thinking of doing all the choreography of his future project Heera Mandi, a film based on classical dancing. And this time it would be official.

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