English is shot through with the Bard's words and phrases, but what of his harder plays, and the work of his successors?

His name is Vinod ... Agent Vinod. He can shoot two pistols simultaneously while diving through the air, disarm nuclear weapons and drive sports cars at terrifying speeds through narrow streets without breaking sweat.

Farhan Akhtar has been the Bollywood star of 2011, both as actor and director.

The Bollywood Trip is a Danish musical about a self-proclaimed Bollywood star who transforms the lives of inmates and uptight staff in a Copenhagen psychiatric unit. It is every bit as awkward as that sounds.

First, Indonesian police were angry about a young policeman's YouTube lip-synching antics. Then, they championed him for softening the image of the force. Now, after he put stardom over police duty, Norman Kamaru has been fired.

It's been dubbed The Hangover of Bollywood, full of F-word expletives, flatulence, right royal cock-ups and a bunch of dufus friends who never seem to get it right in love, money or work. Delhi Belly, produced by Aamir Khan, one of India's biggest movie stars, and starring his nephew Imran Khan, had its international premiere last night at the launch of the London Indian Film Festival (LIFF).

In her years as a leading actress of Bollywood, Priyanka Chopra has taken on a number of different parts. Last year, the former Miss World even starred in a short promotional film to encourage people to pay income tax.

One of India's biggest movie stars, Amitabh Bachchan, has said he is to seek copyright protection for his famed gravelly voice after a tobacco manufacturer used a sound-alike voice-over to advertise its product.

John Abraham - officially one of the loveliest, most down to earth stars in Bollywood.

Aamir Khan is pretty much the first Bollywood star I fell in love with, the first person I wanted to 'be' when I was younger. Over the last two decades, Aamir has developed into one of the finest, idiosyncratic, genius and most adored actors in the industry. He has starred in some of the most successful Bollywood films of all time, including last year's truly exceptional, 3 Idiots. It was great meeting Aamir for the first time as we talked about his past, present and future.

Cecil B DeMille has been there before, of course. As have Pier Paolo Pasolini, Roberto Rossellini, Mel Gibson, Franco Zeffirelli and Martin Scorsese. So maybe it was only a matter of time before Bollywood not only succumbed to the temptation but went one better by making its version in the subject's native land. Yesterday, India's Aditya Productions unveiled plans for a $30m (£19.5m), two-hour-15-min biopic which will be shot in the Holy Land and which it said would be "the first ever – in 79 years – Bollywoodian film on the life of Jesus Christ".

Is Jeffrey Archer set to get the "Jai Ho" treatment? He seems to think so. The novelist and former MP has revealed that two different Bollywood producers have approached him, seeking to turn a recently crafted short story into a Hindi blockbuster. The life peer said the filmmakers believed there was potential to develop Caste-Off into a full film. The short story, included in a recent collection called And Thereby Hangs a Tale, tells the story of an Indian couple from different castes who meet at a stalled traffic signal in Delhi and fall in love.