Posted:
10 years ago
A. L. CHOUGULE analyses the
collapse of star system and death
of TV stardom.Not long ago, like
Hindi cinema, television too could
boast of superstars and star
system -
the top notch actors who were
overhyped and overpaid', the
second rung who commanded
their price and the rest non-
descript ones, mostly
newcomers, who played small
character roles. That was till
about five or six years ago,
between 2000 and 2008.
But post-2008 when child
protagonists displaced the
Goddess-like bahu from her high
pedestal, the star system
collapsed like a castle of sand.
The biggies, with a few
exceptions, lost their market
value and faded into oblivion,
while a few gravitated towards
films. Several second rung stars'
found themselves without work
or were forced to do supporting
character roles - mother, father,
aunt and vamp.
Every year, at least ten serials are
launched on every channel. Most
feature newcomers. But the last
five years, television hasn't
produced a single star who could
match up to the popularity of
Smriti Irani, Ronit Roy, Sakshi
Tanwar, Rajeev Khandelwal,
Shweta Tiwari, Cezanne Khan,
Ram Kapoor, Juhi Parmar or
Urvashi Dholakia.
It goes without saying that most
of them were known by their
character names. But they put
face to characters and their
popularity also went beyond
their screen names. If there are a
few popular stars still around
and some of them still command
their price, they are of the earlier
period - Ram Kapoor, Sakshi
Tanwar, Hiten Tejwani, Ronit Roy,
Iqbal Khan etc.
In contract, most of the
newcomers of last five-six years
are known only by their
character names and easy to be
replaced by someone from the
crowd. Indeed the TV star tag
seems to have gone out of
television lexicon. Hence today
you have only TV actors. "It's true
that in terms of popularity most
of the newcomers are lagging
behind from the earlier lot but
that, I guess, is because the
average shelf life of serials then
was much longer than it is today.
With a few exceptions most of
the serials wind up within a year
or two now," says Hiten Tejwani
who started his career 13 years
ago.
Apart from shorter shelf life, daily
soap concept at prime time was
a novelty in 2000; it existed only
as an afternoon phenomenon on
DD between 1995 and 2000.
Another major reason is stiff
competition and number of
general entertainment channels
which doubled post-2008.
Though between 2000 and 2005
there were three popular GECs,
Star Plus was far ahead of
competition and most of the
popular shows during the period
featuring popular stars of the
time were also aired on it. Hiten
doesn't disagree, "Platform
makes lot of difference. Also,
competition wasn't as stiff as it is
now. Today viewership is divided
between channels and choices."
Apart from more GECs and
content barrage, the concept of
entertainment has also changed.
Though relationship stories
garnished with drama and
emotions still garner higher
share of eyeballs, the average
time spent has steadily come
down post-2008. Growing
popularity of English
entertainment, regional channels,
lifestyle and infotainment (travel,
history, food) content has further
dented consumption of Hindi
entertainment.
Hence, while earlier a top-rated
daily's lead actors would become
stars overnight, today their
character remains their major
identity. Not only stardom eludes
them even after doing a daily for
four to five years, but most of
them don't enjoy stardom even
after doing three dailies or more.
Take the case of lead actors of
five-year-old daily Yeh Rishta Kya
Kehlata Hai. Hina Khan and Karan
Mehra are still known only as
Akshara and Naitik. Deepika
Singh and Anas Rasheed of Diya
Aur Baati Hum, the most popular
show of last two years, haven't
gone beyond the screen names
Sooraj and Sandhya. The case
isn't different with protagonists
of Balika Vadhu, Saath Nibhana
Saathiya and others. On the other
hand, the lead actors of not so
popular mature relationship
story Bade Achhe Lagte Hain,
Ram and Sakshi, are stars in their
own right.
Read more at -
freepressjournal.in/why-star-quotient-is-missing-from-tv/Edited by ArsyRam - 10 years ago
