Showtime: Dec 1988: Dimple Kapadia, Sridevi, Amitabh Bachchan, Vinod Khanna

Showtime: Dec 1988: Dimple Kapadia, Sridevi, Amitabh Bachchan, Vinod Khanna
 

Sridevi on the sets of Nagina: Cover of Movie Jagan magazine

The internet killed off so many magazines, every year I discover a title, only to hear it has long shut shop. Like this Hindi film magazine, Movie Jagan. RIP the Hindi tabloid... 

Sridevi on the sets of Nagina. She looked so beautiful in the film and acted so well. 

TBT: Showtime cover story: Heroines can't do Without Sridevi

Stardust: Why has the industry got together to dethrone Sridevi?

Stardust: Why has the industry got together to dethrone Sridevi? 

Why indeed! 

A Stardust magazine cover story. TBH the war was mostly on between Sridevi and the media more than the film industry. Sridevi didn't get for the tabloid press and didn't court editors or writers, and they highlighted her flops and were dismissive of her hits. But she conquered all with sari-clad ease and elegance. 

 

Sridevi on the cover of Madhuri magazine: 1984 edition

Sridevi on the cover of Madhuri magazine: 1984 edition 

Sridevi's film magazine cover with Shila Shirodkar, Manisha Koirala and others

Can you name all the stars on the cover?! Two of them, even I'm drawing a blank.

This original shot was published in G magazine. Wish I had it! 

Sridevi swathed in fabric was such a gorgeous shot in the early 90s

 

Sridevi: covergirl! Friday Flashback to Feb 1997

Gorgeous Sridevi captured by her fav photographer Rakesh Shreshta. 

This jacket look was a gorgeous one - we have more from this series in the archive - scroll back! 

Evolution of Filmfare covers

Evolution of Filmfare covers. The absolute joy of heading to the newsstands every month to pick up ALL the magazines I could find...  

Sridevi, Madhuri Dixit, Rekha, Juhi Chawla... screen Goddesses. 

 

TBT: Stardust cover with Sridevi, Sanjay Dutt, Dimple Kapadia, Jaya Prada, Anupam Kher, Kiran Kher, Nasserudin Shah

Before there was the internet and trolls, gossip and innuendo and quite frankly libel.. there was Stardust! 

The best-selling film rag of all-time, during its peak, there was no other film magazine that was as powerful, influential and quite frankly, a terror to stars of all strips. 

It was also a highly somewhat unreliable entity. 

Shocking headlines, unverified reports, questionable sources, fake news, petty gossip, scandals, pure fiction, rabid fallacies, all the way down to typos, misspelt names, allegations, bad writing and amateur hour reporting. 

But dammit it was fun. Taking down powerful, rich, spoilt Bollywood brats was key. No one escaped Neeta's Natter... 

The magazine ignited protests, bans, marches... and what not. Back then there was no social media, so stars had no recourse either. 

On the other hand, a star could never get away with murder either. If you behaved badly, if you treated people like crap, if you were having torrid affairs and breaking hearts and home - Stardust reported it unabashedly without fear or censure. There was a time when leading newspapers never featured Hindi film industry stars, if you needed publicity for a film or awareness for a project, you needed to pose and give a stirring interview to the scribes. It was selling at such a pace, they had to publish another film magazine -- Showtime--from the same publishing house to keep up. 

Now... oh my, how the mighty have fallen. With the internet providing free pics, gossip instantaeously, the magazine cannot keep up. Sales have dwindled, advertising is circling the drain... its nothing like what it used to be. The latest covers have been so badly shot and the layout... its like a highschool project. What are these fonts, colours... there was never any fact-checking in the first place, but how about a quick grammar check?! Tsk tsk. 

Nothing lasts forever. Ashes, to ashes, Stardust to dust... we all end up in the grave. 

 

Sridevi on the cover of Mayapuri magazine

Sridevi on the cover of Mayapuri magazine 

In costume for Heer Ranjha. 
 

Tinsel town: Sridevi Enigma Next Door: 90s Indian Icon

Tinsel town: Sridevi Enigma Next Door: 90s Indian Icon 

Sridevi on the sets of Chandra Mukhi (1993): A colour and costume extravaganza

Sridevi on the sets of Chandra Mukhi (1993): A colour and costume extravaganza. Released 30 years ago today, the children's fantasy film written by (or should we say adapted by!) Salman Khan opened with a bang, left with a whimper. 

Certainly counted among the worst films both the leading stars appeared in, both movies have a young fanbase that went along with the madcap antics of the film. 

Teenage sensation Sridevi on the cover of Tamil magazine Bommai

Teenage sensation Sridevi on the cover of Tamil magazine Bommai

Remembering Rishi Kapoor: Death anniversary of the star-actor

Remembering Rishi Kapoor: Death anniversary of the star-actor 

Sridevi and Rishi Kapoor were perfect foils for the other, they matched steps in acting, dancing, natural performance.... Rishi Kapoor spoke so well about Sridevi throughout, eg on Kapil Sharm's show, "Kamaal ki actress thi woh. Kuch bhi kar sakti thi." 

Our huge archive of Rishi Kapoor and Sridevi images here.

The Rishi Kapoor and Sridevi listicle here.

TBT: Sridevi on the cover of Aar Paar, Hindi Tabloid

TBT: Sridevi on the cover of Aar Paar, Hindi Tabloid. 

Fans will recognise her looks from the films Chandra Mukhi and Gumrah. Not sure about the one in white... 

50 Years of Stardust: Sridevi in 26 (give or take) covers

Originally published as the first of its kind film magazine back in 1971 (there were other film-y magazines but nothing as scandalous or gossipy as this!), for some strange reason the publishing house  celebrated the 50th year of Stardust on Jan 28/29, 2023.

Now even our basic mathematics is bad but surely this is the 52nd year of the magazine in 2023, not 50th... A point that no other online portal or newspaper picked up... which is pretty much on brand; accuracy and verifiable journalism wasn't much of a thing for the publication. Publish now, apologise later (if ever) has been a long-standing unwritten motto of Stardust; the deity maker and breaker of the Indian film industry.

Sridevi has appeared in manyyyyyyyyyyyy Stardust covers over her illustrious career - until her tragic and untimely demise. We have but a few of them and a few notable gems are missing in our collection. Sadly, even the editors and writers who worked at the magazine don't have copies as today's news is tomorrow's trash - we are talking pre internet obviously. They didn't save copies, and didn't collect them with a fevered passion like we did.

What do I say about Stardust? Well, growing up, we were strongly discouraged from reading it - especially for the magazine's faulty English - the film rag was the first of its kind to introduce "Hinglish" to the common vernacular, and my parents were horrified. The merry hybrid of Hindi and pop culture English would be intolerable to any English teacher. 

The copy was deliciously decadent; scandals galore, amoral stars and their tales of sex, drugs, alcohol,  and extra-marital affairs, rape allegations, underworld links, gangsters, Mumbai mafia stories, drug-peddlers, drug consumers... there was no topic that was too taboo. And the pictures! Stardust was the first magazine to publish a Bombay starlet topless (Oh Mamta Kulkarni!) fake pornographic image of a Bollywood star on the cover (Pooja Bhatt!) to talk about the ills of the internet! It published scantily clad men, women, starlets, it spoke to mistresses, it was the Indian version of Page 3, Hello! and Playboy.... well, without the nudity, but the words... we blush!

The magazine was high octane on cover tags, they were all screaming; Caught! Confession! Red-Handed! Rape! The words were all bold-faced and bold-type. It really had a knack for bringing down any celebrity with an outsized ego and planting them firmly down to earth. It was gossipy but it was fun - otherwise it wouldn't have been the best selling film magazine in a nation of nearly a billion! 

The rag had its own share of controversies and lawsuits; Dharmendra arrived at the office to threaten writers and editors, Amitabh Bachchan didn't speak to anyone from the magazine for nearly a decade, Saif Ali Khan had a few select abuses for one of the scribes, Rekha and Shabana Azmi sued the publication for defamation (nothing came of it), the Anupam Kher and Mithila Kulkarni (sister of Mamta Kulkarni) molestation allegation was an ugly chapter in all their lives, Mahima Chaudhary spoke about how an editorial had her spiral down into depression... The magazine never held back and punched down and high with equal fervor. 

Many stars tried to ban it, but the Bollywood boycott didn't work - if anything, gave the magazine new lease while several other newsstand rags and the magazine's poorer cousins (Showtime!) came up....  (and petered away...). 

Sadly, as much fun as it was - and it was gloriously campy fun - the end of Stardust as we know it is neigh. The internet and social media, where images and info are distributed free and faster, is slowly choking the magazine out of relevance. 

The publishing house needs a cash cow or go whole hog as an online Bollywood behemoth - but Pinkvilla seems to have that position already. 

Ah Stardust. Thanks for the nostalgia. And Good Luck babe. You're going to need it.