Monday, 18 April, 2005
BBC News
Bollywood stars are to test their talents against a team of Indian cricket legends in a new reality show from the
creators of Big Brother.
The Cricket Match will see 16 Bollywood stars live and train in a cricket boot camp for two weeks.
It will be produced by
Endemol - the Dutch team behind the Big Brother programmes - for India's Star TV.
Peter Bazalgette, of Endemol, said they hoped to sign similar deals in other countries around the world.
The concept of the cricket reality show is based on The Match, last year's UK show from Initial (part of Endemol UK) and Endemol, which saw a squad of celebrities take on a team of Premiership football legends.
It achieved an audience of up to 2.6m on Sky One and has just been commissioned for a second run later this year.
Bazalgette said: "Cricket is the football of India - their biggest sport. As with the football version of The Match, this will deliver television with real human interest, emotion and strong narrative content.
"It also shows the potential of the format to adapt to other sports beyond football and we expect to announce similar deals around the world in the near future."
The Cricket Match will see 16 celebrities live and train together for up to two weeks in a cricket training camp with an international coach who will run all aspects of training and preparation.
At certain points players may even get voted off as part of an interactive public vote, until the roster is reduced from 16 to 12.
At the end of the training period, the team is selected from the remaining players to take part in The Cricket Match - a live one-day match in the Indian city of Mumbai (Bombay).
It is not yet known who will participate in the program or when it will be aired in India.
