John Abraham produced Vicky Donor. It was a low-budget film which did good business. The co-producer of the film was Eros International Media. Lara Dutta has produced Chalo Dilli and the co-producer is Eros International Media. Amitabh and Ajay Devgn produced films, but they were not so successful, e.g. Tere Mere Sapne , Aks, Mrityudaata and Raju Chacha. Amitabh in 2009 produced Paa with Relience Big Pictures and it was a success. The trend now is the collaboration in producing a film between the actors and studios. Akshay co-prskoduced  OMG with Viacom. Ajay co-produced  Son of Sardar with Disney. UTV and Amir collaborated in Peepli Live and Delhi Belly. UTV and Red Chillies  co-produced Chennai Express. The business model consists of the studio bearing the cost of production, marketing and distribution. Actor’s company receives 10-15 per cent of production cost as production fee. Actor’s company may not get intellectual property rights.

Here the actor does not charge acting fees. Actor-producer instead takes a percentage of profits. Thus A – listers like Akshay, Shah Rukh or Amir would not charge Rs. 20-25 crore for acting in a film. As co – producers they agree to take a 50 per cent share of the profit. If the film is successful, both the studio and the actor benefit. If it does note  become successful, the studio has not to pay a huge acting fee. In India, the cost of hiring a star is 35 per cent of the total production cost. As this is too high, it makes sense to de – risk it. They can rope in the actor to share the risk. It is a participatory model. Studios take the financial risk and earn a commission on distribution and also share the profits with the actor – producer in agreed proportion.It is a win-win situation.

The cash flow results from theatre release, cable and satellite rights, home video, pay- per-view, licensing and merchandising and in-cinema advertising. Revenue sharing between the studio and actor offsets the high acting fees.

Even directors have taken to co-producing their films with the studios. Instead of charging a fee, the directors agree to split the profits. Anurag Kashyap and Viacom 18 followed this model in Gangs of Wasseypur.