Bollywood star Aishwarya Rai, whose "Bride and Prejudice" opened here over the weekend, seems to be the flavour of US television but it is not clear if it is helping.

Rai appeared on The Late Show by David Letterman this month looking stunning as usual. However, her conduct has seemed full of affectations to many and her English accent strangely varied between British, American and Indian.

The overall impact was a mishmash of an urbane Indian, not certain whether to be American or British.

She had appeared on CBS' 60 Minutes in January. Her next big appearance is on the Oprah Winfrey show later.

Known for her generally gushing treatment of her guests, the Oprah show is expected to kid-glove the star. The show sent a camera crew to follow her for the premier of Gurinder Chadha's "Bride and Prejudice", released by Miramax Films last week.

A television executive, who was monitoring the appearances, told IANS: "Rai came across as rather well-rehearsed and utterly self-conscious.

"The Letterman show, like any late night comedy show, is about self-important people letting their guards down. She did nothing of the sort. In fact, she seemed rather uppity.

"She could be a hit with Oprah considering the show caters to middle class American housewives in the afternoon where a personality like Rai could work well. I was expecting something compelling in Rai being an Indian film star but she turned out to be just another international celebrity."

It seems Rai's organisers forgot to tell her that the Letterman show is late night comedy and humour is an essential part of it.

Her responses to Letterman's trademark questions were bordering on the testy and appeared to have slightly unsettled the show's host.

When Letterman asked Rai if it was normal in India for grown up children to live with their parents, Rai said something like how in India children do not need to take an appointment with their parents.

There was a moment of brief but loaded silence at Rai's combative response and then came the applause as an afterthought. Letterman quickly regained composure and said: "So we learn here something."

Meanwhile, "Bride and Prejudice" managed a solid opening over the weekend finding a place in the national top-20 chart despite a limited release, according to box office expert Gitesh Pandya.

It grossed an estimated $388,000 from only 32 theatres over the weekend delivering a strong average of $12,125 per theatre.

"That was good enough to give 'Bride' the second best average in the Top 20 close behind Will Smith's number-one hit 'Hitch', which generated the biggest opening in history for a romantic comedy with an estimated $45.3 million from 3,575 locations for a $12,671 average," Pandya said.

"Bride" was the only movie on the list playing in fewer than 350 theatres. Miramax will gradually add more theatres in new markets.