Bollywood seems to be gradually embracing the leading ladies who are married. However, this was not always the case.
Everybody knows that male actors in Bollywood enjoy a longer run (in terms of getting lead roles), whereas that is not the case with female actors. While men still don the heroes role in their fifties, things start changing for women once they hit their thirties.
Until a decade back, getting married for a leading heroine meant giving up their career. Not because they could not manage both home and their professional lives.
It was because the filmmakers were not sure if the leading ladies would be accepted by the audience once they got married.
Read: Top Bollywood Stars who kept their marriage a secret.
However things have changed.
Checkout the leading actresses who have got married in the last few months, and they did not hide it, neither are they insecure about their career.
- Deepika Padukone got married to Ranveer Singh
- Priyanka Chopra will soon get married with Nick Jonas
- Anushka Sharma got married to cricketer Virat Kohli
- Sonam Kapoor got married few months back,
- Kareena Kapoor has been married for a while.
And they all are doing good work in Bollywood!
In the past leading ladies like Mumtaz, Neetu Singh, Jaya Bhaduri, Dimple Kapadia, Tina Munim gave up their careers after marriage.
And there were a few reasons for doing that:
- The filmmakers themselves believed that the Indian audience would not want to see a married woman as the leading lady of the film
- Uncertain of their “filmi” career, heroines would end up marrying rich industrialists to have a secure future. But despite being ultra-rich families, they were still conservative in their thinking and didn’t approve of their daughter-in-law working in the tarnished film industry anymore.
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So in almost all the cases, marriage for the leading ladies meant a full stop to their career.
Back in the ’80s and ’90s, A-list actresses like Meenakshi Seshadri, Madhuri Dixit, Karisma Kapoor, Rani Mukerji, Juhi Chawla and Sridevi tried hard to prolong their filmi career, but when their career started taking a nosedive, they all got got married (‘before it was too late.’)
So what has changed now?
A lot!
India has changed, the outlook and aspirations of the people have changed. Some of the leading companies in the world have offices in India and their professional approach have rubbed on us. Indian companies are now acquiring foreign companies.
Even if you take a look at the film Industry, women are now working as producers, directors, editors, composers…there were the domain of the men until a couple of decades back. Leading actresses are now also speaking up on issues like wage gap.
So things have become a lot professional now, and the audience has also become more mature to accept married actresses.
In all, great time to be in the industry for the leading actresses!
