A housewife from Varanasi proudly proclaims, with suitable sombre music in background, "I was born in a small village. I have no background (wonder what that means!) and I have reached this position. It is a big achievement for me." Well if her achievement was appearing on the TV, my achievement was not losing sanity after watching umpteen claims of 'big achievement' of being on national TV by virtue of participating in a reality show.
Well you can surely call it a case of sour grapes since I have never been even on local TV, forget national, by participating in a reality TV show or without it, which I haven't. (may be because neither have I talent enough to win bouquets nor courage enough to face brickbats)
The point is that MasterChef India (it's not a COPY of MasterChef Australia, it's a licensed Indian version. If you want to know what is a copy, then watch Knock Out, which is a COPY of Phone Booth) is just like any other reality show. There is so much talk of making itihaas and showing junoon and being a soldier in jung ka maidaan that Chhatteesgarh Police can hire the writers of MasterChef India to motivate its embattled jawaans.
Fremantle India was perhaps not sure that the concept would work if the judges were noted chefs and food critics only or maybe this is another must have ingredient of Indian reality shows, a film star, whose role has been played by Akshaye Kumar in this case. His presence is justified by repeatedly telling us that he once worked in a Bangkok restaurant. Come to think of it, Vir Sanghvi may have won Cointreau Award for Best Food Literature Book but is he even one tenth as dishy as Akshaye?
(Wait a second, having a film star as host also means you can spend some airtime with all those "I love you Askshaye" shouts and "aaj meri zindagi kee sabse badi tamanna poori ho gayee" sobs.)
Other two judges are noted (must be among chef community and five star hotel crowd) chefs
Ajay Chopra and Kunal Kapoor. I guess the people working on dressing up these gentlemen decided to spice up (pun intended) their looks because I believe Kunal doesn't really wear a blue suit, yes this blue and Ajay doesn't sport that spiky hair coupled with that shiny grey blazer on his way to work every day. And the writers decided that Akshay is not going to be the only one to be delivering the dialogues so Kunal mouthed inanities like 'Har kitchen ka ek hi badmaash hota hai aur is kitchen ka badmaash main hoon.' Now take that SRK.
Comparing with its Australian cousin, everything in MasterChef India is over the top. The background score is loud. Judges, specially the chefs, seem to be trying too hard to look and sound menacing. And as I mentioned earlier the sermons of Lord Akshay are too boring.
Well it's early days for MasterChef India and there are still lot of eggs (and hearts!) to be broken. Let's just hope Star (both the channel and Akshaye) keep the show watchable.
Well you can surely call it a case of sour grapes since I have never been even on local TV, forget national, by participating in a reality TV show or without it, which I haven't. (may be because neither have I talent enough to win bouquets nor courage enough to face brickbats)
The point is that MasterChef India (it's not a COPY of MasterChef Australia, it's a licensed Indian version. If you want to know what is a copy, then watch Knock Out, which is a COPY of Phone Booth) is just like any other reality show. There is so much talk of making itihaas and showing junoon and being a soldier in jung ka maidaan that Chhatteesgarh Police can hire the writers of MasterChef India to motivate its embattled jawaans.Fremantle India was perhaps not sure that the concept would work if the judges were noted chefs and food critics only or maybe this is another must have ingredient of Indian reality shows, a film star, whose role has been played by Akshaye Kumar in this case. His presence is justified by repeatedly telling us that he once worked in a Bangkok restaurant. Come to think of it, Vir Sanghvi may have won Cointreau Award for Best Food Literature Book but is he even one tenth as dishy as Akshaye?
(Wait a second, having a film star as host also means you can spend some airtime with all those "I love you Askshaye" shouts and "aaj meri zindagi kee sabse badi tamanna poori ho gayee" sobs.)
Other two judges are noted (must be among chef community and five star hotel crowd) chefs
Ajay Chopra and Kunal Kapoor. I guess the people working on dressing up these gentlemen decided to spice up (pun intended) their looks because I believe Kunal doesn't really wear a blue suit, yes this blue and Ajay doesn't sport that spiky hair coupled with that shiny grey blazer on his way to work every day. And the writers decided that Akshay is not going to be the only one to be delivering the dialogues so Kunal mouthed inanities like 'Har kitchen ka ek hi badmaash hota hai aur is kitchen ka badmaash main hoon.' Now take that SRK.Comparing with its Australian cousin, everything in MasterChef India is over the top. The background score is loud. Judges, specially the chefs, seem to be trying too hard to look and sound menacing. And as I mentioned earlier the sermons of Lord Akshay are too boring.
Well it's early days for MasterChef India and there are still lot of eggs (and hearts!) to be broken. Let's just hope Star (both the channel and Akshaye) keep the show watchable.
