Amitabh Bachchan is slated to appear as himself in three new films — Mahesh Manjrekar's Struggler, Sanjay Daima's comedy Ramji Londonwale starring R Madhavan and Kannada film Amrit Dhare.

Says Madhavan, "I play a Bachchan fan in Ramji Londonwale; He's Ramji's lucky mascot in the film. At the end, my character actually gets to meet his icon. When we wrote the situation, we wondered how to approach Mr Bachchan; but he agreed immediately. Ramji Londonwale couldn't have been complete without Amitji's presence."

AB's next special appearance is in Kannada film Amrit Dhare. Explains the film's leading man, Dhyan, "I play a man whose wife is a fan of Amitabh Bachchan.

When my character gets to know that his wife is dying, he somehow arranges for her to meet her idol — that's how Mr Bachchan came into the picture.... It's a fleeting appearance for which Mr Bachchan gave us four to five hours. We shot his scenes in a suite at the Mariott hotel."

Dhyan is all praise for Bachchan. "If he hadn't agreed to do Amrit Dhare, our film wouldn't have been made. He needn't have said yes to a regional film, but he did — only because the plot demanded his presence.

Mahesh Manjrekar's experimental, one-character film Struggler has Manjrekar playing a frustrated wannabe in Bollywood, who runs into Amitabh Bachchan.

Bachchan hasn't charged a fee for any of these films.

"These were token appearances, where I play myself. It would've been preposterous for me to expect, let alone get money for them.

The filmmakers explained situations where their protagonists (who are my fans) needed to come face-to-face with me. I saw no reason to say no to the opportunity to just be myself on screen, that too for such a brief time."