Dubai: Move over Lady Gaga: Bollywood's latest Western celebrity love affair is with US talk show queen Oprah Winfrey. Stars including Shah Rukh Khan, Preity Zinta and the Bachchan clan hobnobbed with Winfrey during her first visit to India earlier this week.
"Was so great meeting you and all the beautiful Bollywooders. Directors, poets, screenwriters, what a nite!" the 57-year-old wrote on her Twitter page after attending a party thrown in her honour by socialite Parmeshwar Godrej.
The guest list included filmmakers Ashutosh Gowariker and Rajkumar Hirani, actors Anupam Kher, his son Sikander Kher, Abhishek Bachchan, Hrithik Roshan, Preity Zinta, Priyanka Chopra, Shilpa Shetty with husband Raj Kundra, Abhay Deol with actress-girlfriend Preeti Desai, Lara Dutta, Dino Morea, Sameera Reddy, Kalki Koechlin, Kangna Ranaut, Anil Kapoor and Imran Khan. Neha Dhupia tweeted a photo of herself with Winfrey, captioned "She is oh! So charming!".
Earlier on Monday, Winfrey visited the home of Amitabh and Jaya Bachchan, where his son Abhishek and daughter-in-law Aishwarya Rai Bachchan also reside with their newborn baby. Abishek and Aishwarya were guests on Winfrey's long-running TV show before it ended last year, and the family had invited her to visit them when she arrived in India.
"The gracious Oprah Winfrey visits our home, to meet us and bless the baby...warm hearted, endearing...drive her to party in her honour. And Oprah in sari...looking lovely!!" tweeted Big B after the party.
Winfrey spent an hour at the house, Jalsa, before emerging with the family and driving to the Godrej party, dressed in an orange sari.
Acompanied by spiritual guru Deepak Chopra, Winfrey was in India to shoot for her new show "Next Chapter", which will see her travelling around the world and interviewing celebrities.
The date for Winfrey's arrival in India was kept under wraps and her presence in Mumbai was only known after novelist and columnist Shobhaa De posted a tweet saying, "Looking forward to meeting the Big O (Oprah) tonight! She is the most amazing, inspiring, influential woman on planet earth. Welcome to Mumbai!"
