LA, October 11, 2005
Ram Choudhry
NRI, (Non-resident Indian) Raju Sharad
Patel, 45, film producer has died at the
Long Beach Memorial Hospital in Los Angeles
on Sunday. At the age of 23, he produced one
of Tom Hanks' first comedies, "Bachelor
Party." After that he produce a film adaptation
of Rudyard Kipling's classic tale "The
Jungle Book" for Walt Disney Pictures.
At the age of 21, Raju Sharad Patel first came
to Los Angeles to distribute "Amin: The
Rise and Fall," a docudrama about the brutal
regime of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, made by
Patel's father, Sharad Patel. Two years later,
in 1984, he made "Party," directed
by Neal Israel, a solid comic follow-up for
rising star Hanks to his successful "Splash."
"In the Shadow of Kilimanjaro." Patel
directed this action-horror film in 1987. After
this he produced two films apiece based on classical
children's literature: Carlo Collodi's "Pinocchio"
and Kipling's "The Jungle Book."
Patel made an Indian-American co-production,
"Kaante," in Los Angeles in 2002 using
Bollywood talent- Sanjay Gupta, starring Sanjay
Dutt and Amitabh Bachchan.
Patel's latest project was a Rs 200-crore multi-starrer
film Hanuman, which he was making along with
pop singer Michael Jackson. Sylvester Stallone
and Jackie Chan were among the big names that
are part of this huge project.
He was born and raised in Kenya. He is survived
by his wife, Dimple; and two sons, Karam and
Amar. Patel had been battling with cancer for
two years
