Let's stop this jealousy game. Honestly, when one actress pushes the envelope, it does well for everybody else.
For example, if an actress hikes her price, other actresses would follow suit, and they would be happy the actress raised her fees, and not be jealous about it. Because it would benefit them too.
Similarly, when Aishwarya got married there were all these rumours about slowing down or taking less work, but nope, even after marriage she took on more work, even worked in Hollywood, continued with her brands etc. Basically, nothing had changed. So she did contribute immensely by helping change the game for married actresses. Exhibitors and producers can breathe easy and not worry about the fact that the heroine is married, because our audience is more mature today. As a result, other married actresses like Vidya, Kareena continued working like before and nothing had changed.
Similarly now, a 40+ mother romancing a younger superstar actor in a romantic film is a very big risk. The audience may reject it too. But if it works, it will augur well for all the actresses post 40 and motherhood and struggling to make a comeback. The writers will be more open minded to writing middle aged women as heroines because they know for fact that audiences have accepted one in a similar role already. And that gives rise to more scripts with good parts for actresses in their 40s, and therefore more actresses will continue to work.
This is a very significant development, and Aish and Karan will get a lot of credit if they pull this off, and she may indeed be called the trailblazer for the Bollywood heroine. But the bottomline is that it is welfare for all, no place for jealousy.
Book Talk
Ye Hai Mohabbatein
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