We have had stars in the recent past like Kajol, Rani Mukerji, Preity Zinta, Vidya Balan, Tabu and Madhuri Dixit amongst others who were all considered attractive and talented. More importantly, they all had distinct personal styles.
The other day as I saw the pictures from the red carpet of an award show, I realised that if I covered the faces of the female celebrities with my thumb or just cropped their heads off, it would be hard to tell one from the other. As we celebrate Women’s Day today, I can’t help but think about the peculiar homogeneity in the way our female celebrities look and dress these days. Whether it’s an award show, a Diwali party or their weddings, it’s hard to distinguish one parade of gowns, desi glam, or pastel-hued celebration from another. Perhaps it’s as simple as one influential celebrity creating a herd mentality, or a manifestation of a larger problem. A shocking lack of experimentation, representation and diversity in Bollywood.
It is hard to name a female A-list celebrity today whom the regular young brown girl can identify with and say, ‘Hey she looks like me and there is room for her too’. Or hey she is queer, but she gets the same opportunities that cis female actors do. The entire machinery seems to have internalised a heterosexual male gaze or the self-critical female gaze and is churning out air-brushed images of female actors posing at angles to emphasise their physical perfection.
