/> Manoj has finally found his dream house.

"We moved into our new place in Oberoi Towers which is just a stone's throw away from where I lived earlier, earlier this week. I've been out of curculation. But my wife Shabana Raza has been doing up our new place brick by brick.

Believe me, for the first time I'm living in a place that I can call home. And it feels wonderful to be a householder in the true sense.'

He didn't tell anyone about it. But Manoj has been bed-ridden for eight months with a back problem.

"I was traveling to my village in Bihar. The state of the roads being what it is, our car plunged into a ditch. My back took the entire impact.

I couldn't move my hand. For eight months I was in bed. But I still took the time off my recovery to do Ganesh Acharya's Swami. I couldn't say no to him. Ganesh is Mahesh Bhatt without the gift of the gab."

Ganesh and Rahul Bose with whom Manoj has teamed up for Rajeev Virani's thriller The Whisperers are the two friends Manoj has found in Mumbai.

"After so many years of searching and being back-stabbed I can proudly say I've found two true friends in Rahul and Ganesh. And of course my wife Shabana (who's given up the name Neha given to her by her discoverer Vinod Chopra.)"

Manoj has just shot his first post-illness film. "It's a comedy called Money Hai To Honey Hai featuring four of us, Govinda, Upen Patel, Ravi Kissan and me. We shot the film in Mauritius. I play a man who lives completely in a dream world. A sort of Mungerilal in Mauritius."

Matching steps with Govinda wasn't an easy thing to do for Manoj. "He's the absolute emperor of the comic genre. And I was relatively new to comedy.

I entered this humorous world with some caution. But to my delight Govinda turned out to be an abolute yaaron ka yaar. Since I don't have a leading lady in the film, most of my scenes are with Govinda.

There was no sense of one-upmanship. The camaraderie between me and Govinda in Mauritius had to be seen to be believed." Apparently the twosome did a lot fun things in Mauritius. "Ah, that I won't tell you about on-record. But Govinda is so much fun.

On the sets I surrendered completely to Ganesh. I've learnt my lesson. No more suggestions to the director unless I'm pointedly asked for it.

I unnecessarily got the reputation of being an interfering soul on the sets when I was only trying to improve our team product. My new year resolution is to do my job and leave the rest to the producer and director."

Co-incidentally Manoj's second new film is also a comedy. "Jugaad is a humourous look at the sealing of properties in Delhi. I like the thought of laughing and making people laugh in my two new films.

For eight months I've been in pain. Now it's time for some fun. But neither Money Hai To Honey Hai nor Jugaad have any buffoonery in them, thank God!"

There was nothing remotely funny about the story Zahir that Manoj did with Diya Mirza in Sanjay Gupta's Dus Kahaaniyan.

"It was my foot-in-the-door into a big banner. For a very long time the big banners have eluded me. Sanjay Gupta is the first big production house to invite me as an actor. He's a filmmaker with a vision. I'm now doing a full-length film Acid with him. It feels nice to be well-settled both professionally and personally."