By Subhash K Jha

With a big hit like Namaste London to his credit, Akshay Kumar is looking to build a body of work beyond the Vipul Shahs and Sajid Nadidadwalas who have given him hits as a regular habit.

Akshay, at this juncture of his career could well do with a Don or a Dhoom 2. And since Farhan Akhtar or Yashraj Films are unlikely to offer him that opportunity, an action-comedy (his forte) film with Nikhil Advani seems like just what the boxoffice doctors ordered.

The Nikhil Advani project, Chandni Chowk To China designed specially for the athletic star, will give Akshay a chance to return to his rugged Khiladi roots, with lots of sophisticated kicks and grunts thrown in.

In fact the film will be shot in South-East Asia and would have many action scenes involving martial artistes.

The rather disappointing performance of Salaam-e-Ishq hasn't dampened director Nikhil Advani's spirits. He's ready to bounce back with a mammoth actioner.

"It's an action comedy," reveals Nikhil, back from Morrocco after shooting an ad with John Abraham.

The other film based on the life of a child from an orphanage that Nikhil wanted to make right after Salaam-e-Ishq has been put on hold.

"That script is taking longer than I thought it would. So I've deicided to move to a ready-made script. My long-standing buddy Rohan Sippy had already worked out the script with Sridhar Raghavan.

When they narrated it to me, I though they just wanted my opinion on it. When Rohan asked me to direct it, I agreed on condition that I can also be the producer. We're working out the modalities of the co- production."

Nikhil has known Roshan Sippy for twenty years. "My wife and Rohan are best friends. So it's all in the family. I'm making an action-comedy for the first time.

It's a good opportunity to try something different. Also I've never worked with Akshay before. He seems to be good fun."

"Action and comedy are, in fact, Akshay's forte," says Nikhil. "And I'm looking forward to directing Akshay in a film that's written by someone else.

I realize I went wrong in the scripting of Salaam-e-Ishq. I should've edited it more ruthlessly on the script's level. Here, all I've to do is put it all on film."

The Akshay-Advani project is now into pre-production.

"It's a very big action film to be shot in the Far East with very sophisticated technical effects done abroad. More than Dhoom 2, it would be like Dhoom in mood.

Dhoom had more comic elements....Call it talent or luck...but right now I'm only piggybacking on the reputation of Rohan Sippy and Akshay. I start shooting at the end of the year.

But the pre-production, including finalizing completely untried locations in South-East Asia and F-X guys from abroad, is taking more time than we thought," says Advani.