Bollywood and coronavirus: with no wedding or fight scenes allowed, how does the Indian film industry survive?

To keep his cast and crew socially distanced on set, Indian film producer Jamnadas Majethia is making everyone carry an umbrella around

Make-up artist Clint Fernandes is asking actresses to apply their own mascara, while producer Atul Kasbekar is considering buying coronavirus insurance

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Actors rehearse a scene for Indian television series Bhakharwadi – holding umbrellas to make sure they are standing far enough apart for social distancing. Photo: DPA

Published: 10:45am, 14 Oct 2020Updated: 7:22pm, 15 Oct 2020

Filmmakers worldwide are struggling with a conundrum: how do you gather people onto a single set while making sure the coronavirus doesn’t spread between them?

Indian film producer Jamnadas Majethia has come up with a novel solution – umbrellas.

Majethia gave an umbrella to every actor and crew member on his Bollywood set, and asked them to carry it with them at all times unless they were actively shooting a scene.

“Whenever people talk or work together, we forget to keep a distance. We are social beings,” he explains. The umbrellas are there to stop that from happening. Majethia came up with the idea at a time India’s coronavirus caseload was growing at a breakneck speed. At one point, the country was seeing some 80,000 new infections each day.

Bollywood is usually a riot of colour and dancing, like this scene with Martin Henderson and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan in Bride and Prejudice. Photo: Accusoft Inc

The pandemic has changed a lot in the Bollywood film industry which, in normal times, is usually a riot of colour, drama, romance, dancing and crowds. Film studios were closed for several months before they were eventually permitted to start making movies, although the process has changed to follow new rules issued by authorities.

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