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Imagine Brad Pitt chewing a Banarasi paan, relishing a frothing lassi on the majestic Ganga ghats in Varanasi. Well, this may actually happen.
The 43-year old actor has serious plans of shooting a full-length Hollywood film in the city by 2008, sources who hosted the Fight Club star in Varanasi in November last year said.
''Brad and his companion Angelina Jolie did not come here only to relish the unrivalled mystical charm of Varanasi but it was a well-planned trip to study the various locations for a future movie,'' a leading theatre personality, who hosted the Hollywood star in the city, said.
''Brad not only enjoyed boat ride on the Ganga river, besides relishing the lassi and paan, but he also videographed many locations on the riverfront, including Darbhanga ghat, Lal Ghat, Rana Mahal Ghat, Ahilyabai Ghat, Daswashamedh Ghat and the Rajendra Prasad Ghat,'' sources added.
"He me that by 2008, he may produce a film to be shot prominently in Varanasi. The venture would have Brad both behind the camera as well as in front of it. We are now eagerly awaiting his next trip to the city,'' sources said.
The star took time out to visit Varanasi while Tomb Raider star Angelina Jolie was busy shooting for A Mighty Heart -- a movie based on Wall Street Journal scribe Daniel Pearl.
Before this only one mainstream Hollywood film has been shot in the city which has been a heaven for Indian documentary filmmakers.
Reknowned filmmaker Ismail Merchant had shot some sequences of the Merchant-Ivory creation The Guru in the bylanes of Varanasi in the late 1960s and in 2004, trouped to the city again with pop diva Tina Turner for studying the locations of the ancient city for his next venture The Goddess where the singer was slated to play the role of Goddess Kali. Tragically, Merchant passed away in May 2005.
Photograph: Getty Images