Did You Know? - Most Yesteryear Female Stars Began As Child Artists
Did you know Baby Fatima, Baby Naaz, Baby Yogeeta, Baby Nanda? Well, remove the word ‘Baby’ and that might give some clue, but not for all.
Did you know Baby Fatima, Baby Naaz, Baby Yogeeta, Baby Nanda? Well, remove the word ‘Baby’ and that might give some clue, but not for all. Baby Fatima was Nargis. Naaz dropped the prefix once she took up adult roles. Nanda was a front-ranking actor once she grew up. So did Yogeeta Bali, a niece of veteran Geeta Bali, till she retired into matrimony. Madhubala was Mumtaz Bano and Meena Kumari was Mahajabeen in real life. Neetu Singh, however, balanced Bollywood with being the Bahu of the Kapoor Khandaan.
Did you know that most yesteryear female stars began as child artists? Like Nargis, Madhubala and Meena Kumari did roles as kids. So did Lata Mangeshkar, before she groomed herself into a singer.
And, did you know that while many girls grew to be heroines, fewer boys, if you take a cursory glance at the Bollywood starlets who made it as adult stars?
Some of them like Raju Shrestha did very small roles that could go unnoticed. Remember Amer Khan as a chorus dancer in the title song of “Yaadon Ki Baraat”? No, actually the naughty boy could be noticed stepping out of the team in the midst of song and dance, lifting his right-hand finger to excuse himself for an urgent visit to the loo!
Viewers have to be vigilant to notice little Sreedevi in a song and dance chorus in ‘Julie’. But not the pretty faces of the 1950s and 1960s. Among them was Sadhna, the future heartthrob of the 1960s onwards. One could almost miss her in the song ‘Mud mud ke na dekh, mud mud ke’ since the focus was all on Nadira. Urmila Matondkar made her presence felt, whether as a kid or an adult.
Among the ‘seniors’ who began as child artists and are still busy is Aruna Irani. She made her debut in Ganga Jamuna playing Azra's childhood character, and went on to do ‘Anpadh’ as Mala Sinha's childhood character. Like most people of that age, the sudden death of the father and family responsibilities forced them into acting. That was how Lata and Nanda began. Daisy Irani and sister Honey Irani also began as bread-earning kids.
As it happens with children of ambitious mothers, Sarika’s career was launched in the early 1960s to make her one of the senior-most artists today. That was how Jayalalithaa and Hema Malini also began but as school-going teens. They were like Vyjayanthimala who was discovered for her dancing prowess.
Of the boys, Master Sachin graduated as Sachin Pilgaonkar doing well in Marathi and Hindi films. Much was in store for Jugal Hansraj (Masoom), but he could not go beyond a few films.
While most child actors did their bit, grew up into adult roles and eventually bowed out, Aruna Irani has been lucky. She won two Filmfare Awards in 1984 and 1992 and on 19 February 2012, she was awarded the 'Lifetime Achievement Award' at the annual Filmfare Awards function.
