Mumbai, Oct 2 : Mumbai Mirror has revealed how Bollywood star Katrina Kaif got her surname Kaif. It's none other than the cricketer Mohammed Kaif. While Mohammed Kaif is now on the sidelines of cricket, unnoticed, Katrina has zoomed to become the lucky mascot of Bollywood films, the latest being Mere Brother Ki Dulhan.
This was revealed by Ayesha Shroff, the producer of Kaizad Gustad's film Boom - the film that launched Katrina in Bollywood.
Says Ayesha: ."Her passport says Turquotte. We created an identity for her. She was this pretty young English girl , and we gave her the Kashmiri father and thought of calling her Katrina Kazi.
"We thought we'd give her some kind of Indian ancestry, to connect with the audience.
"Those times were different, now people are more accepting. But then we thought that Kazi sounded too religious.
" We were to introduce her to the press and at that time, Mohammad Kaif was at the top,and so we said, Katrina Kaif sounds really great .In fact,the brochures for the press say Katrina Kazi. We passed that off saying, 'Oh that's a printing mistake,'" says Ayesha.
Kaizad Gustad, who introduced Katrina to Bollywood, refused to talk about his discovery saying, "I don't want to hurt anyone".
But Ayesha Shroff says: "During the course of some research, Kaizad chanced upon her. He tells me that a few days later, she went to his house and asked him, 'I'm interested in India. Do you think I have a future in India as a model or in films'.
"She came down to Mumbai, auditioned and got the role. I think she had done some modeling in London. I thought she would have a career here. At that time, there was nobody with a good body, no one was wearing bikinis."
But where did Kaizad meet her, Ayesha refuses to say: " I cant talk about it. What's the point . What she has achieved is admirable and its not easy for a woman to pull herself out of nothing and make such a huge name for herself."
Is Katrina in touch with her? Says Ayesha: "No. But that's a personal choice. What hurts me is that she distances herself from Boom. When Boom released, she was seeing Salman, she dismissed her debut saying she didn't know what she was doing and so she did the bikini scene, the smooching scene. No one put a gun to anybody's head. She is a very intelligent young woman, she knows what she has going and doesn't want to jeopardize it."
Her Tees Maar Khan director Farah Khan,"Katrina has the X- factor.There are prettier girls who haven't made it.She has the same fire that actresses like Sridevi and Madhuri had. The audiences love her,especially the kids."Farah adds that no one promotes a film like Katrina does.
And that she has never heard Katrina backbite.She says,"Katrina stresses about the way she looks. But she never frets over petty issues like my vanity van is too small."
Though Akshay Kumar had recommended her,Farah was initially hesitant,"I thought they'd done too many films together."On the sets,Farah was no closer to knowing Katrina intimately.She laughs,"I don't think anyone in the industry really knows her,give or take one or two people. But I've met her mother. Katrina is quite the family girl."
