A glimpse of Himanshu Rai’s entrepreneurial spirit and confidence comes alive in his quest for the sole rights to film British monarch King George V's Silver Jubilee celebrations in India in May 1935.
Himanshu Rai's Bombay Talkies is the most likely inspiration for Jubilee's Roy Talkies. And the affair between the co-owner of the studio and a new actor - that has a parallel in Bollywood history too.
Wamiqa Gabbi, who plays to perfection a courtesan-turned-actor of the 1940s-50s Bombay Hindi cinema in Vikramaditya Motwane’s ‘Jubilee’, on learning acting on the job, being first rejected for the role, and working with Vishal Bhardwaj next.
Vikramaditya Motwane’s ‘Jubilee’, the Amazon Prime Video series about the heady early years of Bombay cinema, and two non-fiction Netflix titles whet the appetite for our shared love of Bollywood, bypassing the exasperation and ugliness