In Mumbai, there's a particular whiff of I'm too good to stare at stars, and some go out of their way to inconvenience them to show they are above it all! Most just live and let live.
In the Indian diaspora, when the Indian/Pakistani/Bangladeshi... really, any Bollywood viewing community (the love Russians have for Mithun Chakraborty and Raj Kapoor is surreal) sees a real true blue Indian movie star, they go from breathless excitement to full Beatles-mania.
I've been very lucky to see several stars perform on stage. And my top, top dancers have been, Prabhu Deva, Hrithik Roshan, Madhuri Dixit (no surprises), Aishwarya Rai, Sridevi, Shahid Kapoor, Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Sushant Singh.
The worst dancers I've seen on stage have been... Tabu, Sonam and Parineeti Chopra. Pari.. who was a lovely person, interacted kindly with fans, is a fine actress... was just dreadful as a dancer. Sonam was very chatty with fans and looked great... but not a great dancer. Tabu... give her all the awards for her histrionics, but she stomps the stage like a Clydesdale. Just dreadful. Most TV stars when they travel on stage shows... reveal all their failings. There's a reason why they can't make the leap to big-screen stardom.
Akshay Kumar interacts with fans and puts on an 'show' per se... but there was little dancing on his end - despite being rather good on screen. Abhishek also does a lot, but he is more movie star and actor than...dancer. Siddharth Malhotra is stiff and... relies on looks than actual fluid movement on stage. Ranveer Singh and Varun Dhawan are so hyper... the batteries on full blast. Strangely Anil Kapoor's not that good dancing, but he does speeches from his movies, acts out bits... Johnny Lever is the greatest live comedy show - truly desi and blessed with infinite talent.
Sridevi... what can I say. Firstly, you're in awe that it really is 'the' great Sridevi on stage. She's tall, statuesque... looks like doll, dances like a dream. Graceful, gorgeous, a sea of outfit changes... Her expressive face, and her elegance... She really did fall from the heavens and grace our stage for a while. Just too short a time...
