Sridevi and her co:stars: Anil Kapoor, Amitabh Bachchan and Vinod Khanna

Wish I had a clearer scan of this feature and magazine. Sridevi with her costars Anil Kapoor, a rare pic with Amitabh Bachchan and another with Vinod Khanna. 

All on film sets; Roop ki Rani Choron ka Raja, Khuda Gawah and the unreleased Garajna. 

Anil Kapoor and Sridevi on the cover of a Hindi tabloid

 

Throwback to the summer of 1993, during the aggressive pre-release promotions of Roop ki Rani Choron ka Raja, Sridevi and Anil Kapoor carpet bombed every film magazine cover real estate and gave endless - and mostly the same- interviews. The promotion rigamarole can be exhausting. As Sridevi famously said during Mom film promotions (or was it EV?!) "Picture se dar nahin lagta, promotions se dar lagta hai!"  

Teenaged Sridevi in a sari: Precious Icon

Ai translation of this vintage magazine feature - so it is sort of accurate but exactly but... you get the gist! 

 "What if all fans rush to marry me?"
-- Sridevi

Writing love letters to actresses is a hobby for fans. Some fans write love letters, carefully mail them to the stars, and then completely forget about it. However, some other fans make it their sole mission; they sit on their doorsteps, eagerly waiting to see if a reply will come.

"...I want to start a business. I want you to cooperate with me for that, and you must marry off your daughter Sridevi to me. I will look after your daughter very carefully without causing her any hardships," etc., etc. He used to write all sorts of things.

Our father used to read those letters...

No matter how much effort these fans put into their emotional poetry and romantic madness in their letters, actresses do not care at all. They just laugh it off playfully and leave it at that. And the fans do not even realise this. 

But some fans are very serious. They take everything quite seriously. Sridevi tells us the story of one such eccentric fan who used to watch Sridevi's movies dozens of times and started writing endless love letters: "An ardent fan from a village near North Arcot used to repeatedly send letters to my father. "I have two lakh rupees. I want to start some business..."...and throw them away after ripping them up. Once, he wrote in a letter that he was coming to our house in Madras with his mother on a specific date. As usual, my father tore up that letter and threw it away. No one took it seriously.

Then one day, a person wearing pants, a shirt, sunglasses, and a shoulder bag arrived at our house along with an old woman. Not knowing who they were, my father went pale.

Looking at my father's questioned expression, that person smiled and said with absolute confidence, "You look like you don't know who I am. Didn't you read the letter I sent you?" My father then understood the situation. He made him sit down and started asking for details. While they were talking like that..."

Mithun and Sridevi: May 1984 Cine Blitz: When the Rumours First Started!!

As early as May 1984, film magazines were publishing rumours about the infamous Sridevi -- Mithun scandal. 

In fact, Cine Blitz published a news bite on the two regularly -- as did most Bollywood tabloids. 

Cine Blitz, May 1985

Cine Blitz, 1987

Cover girls: Sridevi, Rekha, Dimple Kapadia: Ladies of the 80s

Cover girls: Sridevi, Rekha, Dimple Kapadia: Ladies of the 80s

Sridevi and Mithun Chakraborty: the Stardust staple!

In the mid 1980s, there was no bigger scandal than the alleged affair between the Number One leading lady in Indian cinema, Sridevi, versus the Bengali Babu Mithun Chakraborty. 

Their scandalous on-set rumoured relationship was the talk of the town and reams of magazines printed features and images on the two in hushed tones and bold headlines. Like this Stardust cover story from 1987! Though neither of them officially ever spoke of it or on the topic, quotes were stitched together to create salacious narratives. Four films later, as Sridevi's career escalated, Mithun's dramatically declined. They never worked together despite giving three back-to-back blockbusters, between 1984-1989, as the family couldn't cope with the tabloid frenzy.  

Both stars were Stardust staples; whispers and quotes from "insiders" and unnamed friends were cobbled together for cover stories. The tabloids couldn't get either star to pose together for a still photograph (unless on a film set), so they had to stitch together different pics eg above, Sridevi's regal still from Sultanat with a separate shot of Mithun Chakraborty. 

Till date we are asked, did they or didn't they marry, let alone have a fling in the 1980s. Well, as we weren't there on set and there's scant evidence of their "marriage", we're going to let this one slide without comment. 

Mithun with Sridevi vs Sridevi with Boney Kapoor: The Tabloid Daze and Knights

Mithun with Sridevi vs Sridevi with Boney Kapoor: The Tabloid Daze and Knights! Of scandal, rumour and headlines. 

Rishi Kapoor and Sridevi on the cover of a Hindi Tabloid

Sridevi's costume from the film Banjaran - a rare still of Sridevi smiling on set. 

 

Rare stills of Rahul Roy, Sridevi and Sanjay Dutt from the sets of Gumrah: 90s

 

Sridevi stills from Gumrah - some of these are so rare, even for us!

Is Mithun Divorcing Yogeeta to Marry Sridevi? In a word, NO!

Oh Indian tabloids were wild! Bollywood stars had no recourse either - filing a case against writers and publishers were an expensive and insanely long drawn-out process that served little. Stars had to opt to look the other way.

Now with Instagram and direct access to fans and a wide number of people stars can release an immediate statement. Sometimes carefully crafted, otherwise, leading to haphazard results on Twitter!  
 

Indian tabloid's favourite girl: Sridevi

Sridevi with Mithun, Anil Kapoor (Sonam and Jackie Shroff), and the infamous Sridevi and Boney Kapoor wedding/pregnancy announcement cover. 

 

Sridevi in tabloids in the 1990s

Even in silence and mostly reluctance, Sridevi was a fixture in Bollywood press. The perils of pan-Indian, national fame and national craze!

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Hindi press with Sridevi, Anil Kapoor, Anupam Kher

Hindi press with Sridevi, Anil Kapoor, Anupam Kher

Sridevi on the cover of Mayapuri: In costume as Heer

 

Sridevi in Hindi tabloids in the early 90s

Sridevi in a Hindi tabloid... Sridevi on the sets of Gumrah.

Has Sridevi reached the Zenith of her career?

In the summer of 1988, when Sridevi was just 25, just five years into the Hindi film industry, the media was asking, "Has Sridevi reached the zenith of her career?" By then, she was already a pan-Indian superstar with box-office hits, stellar performances and ever-growing fame that swept beyond borders. 

Little did the myopic writer/editor know the best was yet to come - I mean this was before Chandni, Lamhe, Khuda Gawah, English Vinglish... and on and on and on... 

Many star-actors have a pinnacle, and everything else is a watered down version of that original performance. If Rekha peaked at Umrao Jaan, by the time she was doing yet another mujra in Yatra in 2006, it was a faded avatar of her original performance. The song and dance routines that were the apex of Madhuri Dixit's career in the blockbuster Hum Aapke Hain Kaun..., till date, producers and directors have been giving her routines that are a shade lesser than the original technicolour vision of the Barjatyas. 

With Sridevi, it always felt her best was yet to come. Like watching Amitabh Bachchan in Deewar, Alaap, Zanjeer, Black, Pink...,, its incredible that Big B is still bettering his only competition, his past self. Like Bachchan Snr, there was no end to Sridevi's infinite spools of talent. Yash Chopra told Shahrukh Khan that Sridevi was the most exciting actress he had ever worked with as there was no end to her vast range. Just recently saw Kalki and at 81, Bachchan is still knocking it out of the park. He out Gandolfed, Gandolf! Sridevi was still a contender with, what eventually, and tragically, became her unexpected swansong, Mom. What other performances were still within her... alas, we'll never know. 

Truly a once in an era kind of supernova. 

 

TBT: Tabloid headline: Anil Kapoor Shocked! How Sridevi took him for a ride!

Remember when Indian film tabloids just made shit up? Now its that x million but its on Bollywood blogs online. The pressure to have new material and eyeballs and click rates means clickbait with bullsh*t newsbytes without any proof or truth. I'd like to say its a new phenomenon but in film journalism, this isn't the exception to the rule, but a handy tool to sell, sell, sell. 

I remember a colleague in a local tabloid saying, "The news doesn't have to be factual, it has to be interesting!"

In many ways, from the early days of Stardust to innumerable news channels and blogs, fact gets muddied for fresh fiction. This spread is... a fine example. 
 

Sridevi in print: Tabloid babe of Bollywood

Sridevi in print: Tabloid babe of Bollywood 

Sridevi and Anil Kapoor on the cover of Aar Paar: TBT to 1988

Sridevi and Anil Kapoor on the cover of Aar Paar: TBT to 1988.

The Sridevi the centrefold... 

Left: Gossip excerpt about Sridevi's FIRST film production:

"Sridevi is not one of those upstarts who forgets regional cinema as soon as they hit the bigtime on the Hindi screen. The minute she realised that she had become a very wealthy woman, she went into film production and launched a film in her mother tongue, Telugu. Being a star out here in Bombay, she has picked up big names from the Hindi film world for her Telugu venture. Besides Bappi Lahiri, who is scoring the music (since all his tunes sound the same it doesn't matter if he doesn't know the lingo). Sridevi has hired the services of dance director Saroj [Khan], also from Bombay. And guess who she wanted as the villain in this Telugu production? None other than our own Doctor Dang alias Anupam Kher, who opted out due to a problem over dates and price. Being a very discreet girl, Sridevi has no guest appearance in her film for secret lover, Mithun Chakraborty..."