Shilpa Shetty to get Rs 3 crores for 25 days

By Bollywood Hungama -

December 26, 2006 - 12:00 AM IST

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Shilpa Shetty was in Sydney and Melbourne to promote Life in a Metro, being distributed by MG Distribution in Australia and New Zealand. In this short two day visit, Australian media went wild for Shilpa Shetty on her whirlwind tour of Australia to promote her new movie Life in a Metro, which releases internationally on 11 May.

Despite being in Australia only 48hours, Shilpa Shetty participated in a grueling publicity schedule of over 25 face-to face interviews and photo shoots, plus spoke to packed press conferences in both Sydney and Melbourne. She was overwhelmed with the media attention and was even greeted at the airport by waiting paparazzi as she disembarked.

Widespread rumours of Shilpa making an appearance on the ongoing Big Brother show in Australia made the press even more intrigued about her visit.

Interviewed by leading national breakfast television program Channel Nine Today Show live on air only hours after her arrival, Shilpa enjoyed the opportunity to talk about her latest film release. Her tete-a-tete with Richard Wilkins was full of witty retorts by Shilpa to all of Richard's questions around the recent controversies involving her. She was a guest on top-rating breakfast radio programs in Sydney and Melbourne, did phone interviews for other states and New Zealand media, was profiled on national current affairs television programs and interviewed by the significant daily newspapers.

Representatives from UTV traveled to Australia to screen, in an unprecedented first, an almost complete version of the film to the mainstream Australian film reviewers.

The Sydney Morning Herald covered Life in a Metro as well as profiled Shilpa. Her live interview on Jacqui O & Kyle Sandilands show on 2Day FM resulted in many fan calls to the radio station soon after she left the studios. Others who will carry features/ stories on Life in a Metro are Herald Sun, The Age, ABC television, ABC Asia Pacific Focus, Movie Network show among others.

At Melbourne, a press conference was held at the National Gallery of Victoria, where the Cinema India exhibition was on. Limited press screenings were held for reviewers in Sydney and Melbourne. Reviews for the film will appear next week.

On Life in a Metro, she was forthcoming to say how privileged she was to share screen space with some of India's most talented actors and of course Director Anurag Basu, whose survivor spirit for life is so well reflected in the film.

Clearly Shilpa's international appeal is not limited to UK, and MG Distribution. UTV Motion Pictures worked on this very premise on the unique promotion strategy for this film in Australia.

"We had an amazing response to Shilpa's visit and to the opportunity for the broad Australian media to preview and review Life in a Metro. This is an important milestone in MG Distribution's continued penetration of the Australian marketplace, and in continuing to build a cross-over audience for our releases. It was a pleasure and an honour to have Shilpa Shetty as our guest in Australia. She is an incredibly articulate ambassador for Indian Cinema and we were delighted to host her," said MG Distribution director Mitu Bhowmick Lange.

Says Siddharth Roy Kapur, EVP Marketing, Distribution & Syndication, UTV. We were expecting a great response from the mainstream media in Australia, but the coverage and reaction we got was way beyond our expectations!'

Tags : Shilpa Shetty