CAN TELUGU INDUSTRY EVER PRODUCE ANOTHER
`SAVITRI’?

The Role and contribution of the
Actresses in Telugu Industry
There is no denying that like in any other language, the Telugu film
industry is also predominantly a hero dominated industry. But traditionally the role and contribution
of the Actresses in Telugu industry used to be very significant and they used
to give run for the money to the Heroes.

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Savitri |
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Jamuna |
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Vanisri |
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Sridevi |
Closely followed on their heels was the era of Vanisri, Jayalalita and
Sharada again very dominating female actresses with huge fan following
specially female fan following. They
had more than a decade run with NTR, ANR, Krishna and Shobhan Babu. Come 80s a new crop of heroines have hit the
Telugu industry viz., Jaya Pradha, Jayasudha, Sridevi and Vijaya Shanti, all of
them were extremely talented and had the ability to shoulder equal
responsibility with the heroes of that time.
With producers becoming more prolific and most of the super hit Telugu
hit movies being remade in other languages specially Hindi, these actresses
specially Sridevi and Jayapradha had crossed over to Hindi film industry. Sridevi had not only settled in Bolloywood
but has also become most successful and top heroine.
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Jayaprada |
Start of the worst trend
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Chiranjeevi |
By late 1980s NTR has left movies and gone into politics and the aging ANR,
Krishna and Shoban Babu have slowed down and the Telugu industry was looking
for new stars. New crop of heroes viz.,
Chiranjeevi, Nagarjuna (son of ANR), Balakrishna (son of NTR) and Venkatesh
(son of famous producer Rama Naidu) have found their footing and started
establishing their fan following base. Of
the four Chiranjeevi definitely was head and shoulders ahead of others churning
hit after hit which made fans confer him the titles of `Supreme Hero’ first and
then the `Mega Star’. He to a
great extent could fill the vacuum created by the exit of NTR atleast for the
mass fans. So a phase has come in
Telugu industry where like in case of NTR, producers were ready to accede to any
demand of Chiranjeevi to get him sign on the dotted lines for their next
movie. NTR at his peak was known for
peculiar demands of asking producers to make Mohd Rafi sing for him (which was
no mean feat at peak of the singer’s career) or Shankar Jaikishan score music
for his movie or Helen/Aruna Irani do item numbers in his movies. Following in his footsteps Chiranjeevi
started the trend of asking producers to sign Bollywood established stars to be
signed opposite him which was never the trend hitherto. So Bollywood actresses like Nagma, Sonali
Bindre, Ravina Tandon, Juhi Chawla, Anjala Zaveri, Sridevi (as a comeback to Telugu industry
after establishing in Bollywood).
Producers not only used to shell out huge amounts compared to what has
been paid to Telugu heroines but used to put up with all sorts of unreasonable
demands of the Bollywood heroines. It might be possible that the other top heroes
might have taken it as a prestigious issue that they should also get Bolloywood
heroines opposite them. Nargarjuna immediately followed suit with
Nagma, Tabu, Ranjni etc., and Venkatesh and Balakrishna also joined the band
wagon thus opening flood gates for Non Telugu speaking heroines at the cost of
Telugu speaking actresses.
Around that time the death of Shaudarya and super stardom of Vijaya Shanti
and her decision to
do solo movies with the tag of `Lady Amitabh’ has created a vacuum of Telugu speaking heroines in
Telugu industry. This added to the
penchant and craving of Telugu heroes for Hindi speaking actresses unfortunately
have brought down curtains on the opportunity for Telugu speaking budding
heroines. The trend of every film/every
hero having a new non Telugu speaking heroines got so entrenched that it has
been over two decades that a new Telugu speaking heroines has ever been
introduced in Telugu films. With over
120 movies being produced in Telugu every year they could not get that many
established Bollywood heroines, so slowly they started giving break to the new
and budding aspirants from Mumbai, many parts of Punjab, Bengal, Gujarat, and name any
state in India except Andhra/Telangana.
What lead to this unexplainable
craving and worst trend
No one could put a hand what lead to this rut in the State of Andhra/T
which produced most talented actresses like Savitri, jamuna, Vanisri, Sridevi,
Jayaprada, Jaya sudha and Vijayashanti could not produce one single actress in
more than two decades.
I personally feel that it is a result of sense of inferiority complex of
our heroes post 1980s. As explained
above the heroines of Telugu industry were extremely talented and fantastic
actors,
dancers and could garner huge fan base. The actors of yester years like NTR and ANR
working in disciplined atmosphere in
banners like Vijaya, Vahini, Gemini and AVM used to take lot of efforts in
perfecting their diction, dialogue delivery modulating and orientation. It was
reported that for mythological movies NTR used to take tutorial from Tirupati
Vekatakavulu and used to make lot of efforts to get perfection in delivering Sanskrit
and Chaste Telugu dialogues. Compared
to this the command over the Telugu and dialogue of Chiranjeevi, Balakrishna,
Nagarjuna and Vekatesh in 90s and Ram Chanran, Allu Arjun, Mahesh Babu, Prabhas
now is anything but perfect. They bank
heavily on their stardom rather than acting abilities. Under these circumstances it is not in their
interested to be pitted against heroines who have a command over Telugu
language, good in acting and dialogue delivery. If they succeed and attain stardom then they
may start demanding meaty roles, scenes, dialogue and there is always a chance
of their overshadowing these mediocre heroes.
The best and easiest way to come over this risk is to take Non Telugu
speaking and new heroines for every movie.
All these plastic faced non Telugu speaking actresses look and sound so
awkward in the absence of lack of understanding of the languages, struggling to
lip sink and emote. So neither these
heroines have any substantial role, meaty dialogues nor any significant part to
play in any movie. Their role is
reduced to being oompish, go through few
song and dance sequences invariably at foreign location for reasons best known to
the heroes and be around in absolutely unavoidable scenes in the movie. Though many of the heroines have been acting
for years in Telugu movies their dialogues get dubbed by dubbing artistic who
in most cases mess it up. The simple
strategy being followed by our great heroes is `long line and short line formula’ – shorten the line of heroines so that
their line looks longer/bigger. As a result of this strategy, in the last two
decades more than 100 new non Telugu speaking heroines were introduced in
Telugu films (a new heroin in every second film) and not even a single Telugu speaking
girl was given break. With these non Telugu speaking girls being
new to State/place being among unknown people unknown language always live on
the edge and treat the heroes larger than life and as their `masiahas’
which surely massage the king size ego of our heroes. Moreover, there are about eight top heroes
and every new entrant whose first couple of moves hit the bull’s eye pair
atleast once with all the eight top heroes then get degraded to the second
string of actors and within four years it is pack off time. That allows our heroes with king size ego breathe easy. This suits these young
girls who come down to the state by dozens as they make fast buck and pack off
to do some business in their home states.
This disease has spread so much that not only the leading heroes but the
second and third string heroes and even the comedians turned heroes ask for and
get a non Telugu speaking heroines imported from North. Apart from the roles of heroines for other
small roles also non Telugu speaking girls are roped in.
Others Imports from Bollywood:


Who will bell the bit bad cat?
The entire Telugu film industry is completely in the vicious grips of
four filmy families and a cartel of producers.
What they wish is the Rule and they do not let anyone raise their head or
voice. Sri Reddy is now being branded in many ways negatively
and brushed aside by the powerful MAA (Movie Artists Association) by denying
her membership. The casting couch which
she threatens to expose is not new to Telugu industry or to the entire film industry
in India or world over. Many leading Hindi actresses and even Hollywood actresses
have come out against exploitation. Why
the top actors or MAA didn’t address her question why opportunities are not
given to Telugu speaking budding actors rather than finding fault in what she
did. If the Telugu film industry cannot
survive without importing stars from Bollywood then why heroes are not imported
from Hindi and other languages in place of our heroes. Maharastra Government was worried about the
labour class in the state is being dominated by people from UP and Bihar and
there were so many protests on this issue.
In America when more than 30% of soft professional are from India the
Trump Government is worried and put so many sanctions in place. But in Telugu film industry 100% of heroines
and villains are imported from Non Telugu speaking states for last two
decades. Shouldn’t that bother anyone? After all it is a matter of employment to
the locals. I am all for right for
employment anywhere in India but surely not cartelisation to complete deny
opportunities to Telugu speaking actresses.
Both Andhra and Telengana Government should take note of this in all
seriousness and insist that Telugu speaking artists and technicians should be
used atleast in those movie which claim subsidies from the state
Government. When we talk of up
liftment of the Telugu language, it should be in all walks of life including
film industry. The audience should do
their bit by boycotting Telugu films featuring non speaking heroines and
villains/character actors. I would like
to see another Mahanati Savitri, Jamuna and Bhanumati in Telugu Industry and
another `Gaana Gandharva’ Ghantasala and SP Balasubramaniam.
S. Prabhakar
9.4.2018