/> From the US to Mumbai, Manish Acharya has lately shifted base and is feeling far more at home....Except when strangers walk up to him and wonder why the film has misspelt the leonine word in the title.

Explains Manish, "Actually the title is a homage to my love for Bollywood conventions The yesteryears villain Ajit was known to pronounce 'lion' as 'loin'.

An elderly Punjabi gent actually asked me, 'I hope you know there're two meanings in the title.' But seriously I must be the only filmmaker in the world to have used the 'L' word in my title, and proud of it."

Manish's faked pride melts in his rather unguarded appreciation of his leading lady. "It was Ayesha Dharker who suggested that I sign Shabana Azmi for the role of Mrs Rrita Kapoor. Please don't miss the two 'r's. I wanted to take a dig at the Indian film industry's fascination with numerology.

If you see the film once you'll miss the two 'r's in Shabana's character's name. There are many such references in the film that I put in for people to go for a repeat viewing."

Returning to how he signed Shabana, Manish says, "I was hesitant. Would she do a comedy, and that too with a first-time director? When I met Shabana in Mumbai she was receptive and open to the idea. I've become her huge fan and want her to in all my films.For me those filmmakers who don't have a crush on Shabana don't exist."

About Shabana, so far known as a serious dramatic actress and with a penchant for histrionics, Manish clarifies, "This isn't a comedy in any obvious way. None of characters in the plot find their own actions funny.

It's like Charlie Chaplin eating a shoe. We found it funny. But to Chaplin it was a deeply tragic moment. To me comedy is what Chaplin, or Woody Allen, or nearer home what Hrishikesh Mukherjee did. No fancy camera movements, no trolley shots, just a straightforward narration."

In fact Manish chose his crew for his first film on the basis of how each member empathized with the plot and characters.

"And to carry the authenticity to the outer limit I've got every actress who participates in the singing contest to speak English in her own authentic accent...Shabana speaks in a Oxonian-St Stephens accent...The ladies also sing a song each in their own voices. I didn't want to artificial recording-room voices," says the young filmmaker who now lives in Mumbai with his wife and two sons.

Remembering his first meeting with Shabana Manish says, "I told her at the outset that the convention of actors watching themselves on the monitor after every shot won't be followed on my sets. I find it distracting.

On the first day of shooting she did go to the monitor and I did comment that I'd have to let all the other members of the cast take a peek at the monitor. After that Shabana never returned to the monitor. I started the film with having a crush on Shabana the Actress. I finished admiring the humanbeing."