Source: HT
Date: January 21, 2010
Hrithik Roshan, Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgan, Anil Kapoor, Govinda, Mithun Chakraborty these are some of his highprofile clients. He has trained them in dance style action.
Hrithik Roshan and Uday Chopra were his students at 12. He reminisces, ""They would practise the monkey walk every morning on Juhu Beach. They would travel to class every day in a Merc. Once I told their parents to get them to walk from Juhu to Andheri. And they did."" Shetty remembers Hrithik as a good learner who was passionate about his workouts. He continues, ""I had a poster of Sylvester Stallone from Cobra. Every day, Hrithik would stand in front of it and ask me if he would become like him some day. I assured him that he would be better than him.""
Hrithik's early initiation into martial arts made it easy for him to perform those difficult stunts in Krrish.
Shetty explains, ""Hrithik was supposed to undergo a four-week rigorous martial art training in China. But he had to rush back to India after two weeks and couldn't go back. But he performed the stunt scenes so well during the shoot. When asked how he managed it, he attributed it to his martial art training at 12."" Shetty points out that martial arts training builds a flexible body and makes one agile, making it easy to perform action scenes. His association with Akshay Kumar began when they attended western dancing classes together. He adds, ""After that, we would go on his bike to Madh Island to practise martial arts together. I taught him for a year-and-a-half. We continued with our bike rides even after he became an actor.""
Shetty was touched when fight master Veeru Devgan entrusted his son, Ajay, in his care. So impressed was Shetty with Ajay's dedication and moves that he shot a 3½ minute video film with him. He reveals, "He was offered Phool Aur Kaante after producer Dinesh Patel watched it."
And did you know that Mithun Chakravorty had really thin legs and refused to wear shorts while shoot ing for Boxer? Shetty laughs, "I told him to attach weights to his legs and work out, to develop his calf mus cles. Even his younger son, Rimo trained with me." Shetty wants to teach a combination of Jeet Kune Do and Cheetah, his own style of martial arts. Besides promoting martial arts in India, his future plans include a film based on martial arts with mainstream actors.