Close to two decades of constant media attention, yet she remains a glittering icon, more symbol than real, defined almost entirely by how she looks.
Aishwarya Rai has an ‘adjective’ problem. She is reportedly the highest paid actress in Indian cinema with her pick of the best roles, banners and directors. Each of her movies in 2010 — Raavan, Robot, the recently released Action Replayy, and soon to premiere Guzaarish — is a five-star production that most actresses can only dream about. This is the face that has launched a thousand magazine articles, and yet not one word in them reveals the woman behind that immaculate visage. Nearly two decades of constant media attention later, she remains a glittering icon, more symbolic than real, defined entirely by how she looks. “I don’t know of anyone who is crazy about Aishwarya,” says filmmaker and critic Paromita Vohra. “[Hers] is a sort of empirical or quantitative success, by virtue of ticking off all the correct surface qualities.” And that perfect ‘surface’ is all that everyone talks about.
Her leading men tend to be oddly laconic in their compliments. Take, for example, Hrithik Roshan, an actor with whom the reigning Bollywood queen shares true celluloid chemistry. Earlier this year, Roshan described the lowly Kangana Ranaut as “an incredible actor” with “no ego” whose “spirit and enthusiasm is infectious”. Yet in a recent interview promoting Guzaarish, Hrithik Roshan was more reserved: “She is one of my favourite co-actors. Ash and I have proven to be a 100 per cent success.” Her Action Replayy co-star, Akshay Kumar, worked just as hard at saying very little. Describing the experience as “interesting”, he added, “it’s also refreshing to work with someone with whom I have not worked with for a while.” Rai’s staunchest admirers tend to damn her with impersonal praise. Directors and dance choreographers rave about her “work ethic”, while fans laud her “dignity” and “poise”. The most her own husband can do is describe her as “a true professional”. At best, she’s a perfect looking, perfectly behaved actress, a model of good behaviour than a flesh-and-blood woman of substance. “Perfection can be its own curse; it may be admirable but not appealing,” says author Sanjay Suri.
| FACE VALUE |
| Won the Miss World crown in 1994 |
| Debut in films with Mani Ratnam’s Iruvar (Tamil) in 1997 |
Hollywood films
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Endorsements
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| Endorsement fee: Rs 2-2.25 crore Fee per film: Rs 5 crore |
Ash’s critics, on the other hand, have no problem in getting specific and personal — accusing her of being all ‘surface’, all the time. She’s been attacked as “fake”, “manipulative”, and “self-obsessed”; a “cosmetic wonder” with an “impeccable hype record”. In comparison, her most vigorous defenders only get personal when they attack her attackers. “Throughout her career, the media has painted Aishwarya as ‘plastic’, an ‘ice-maiden’, ‘wooden’, ‘artificial’ and a ‘non-actress’. This, despite the fact that she has acted in more than 40 films ... entered the industry as an outsider, without a godfather. Today her face is more recognised globally than any other Indian actor,” rants author Chetan Bhagat, accusing her critics of “Ash envy”. Not that we are envious, but she is merely successful, a descriptor devoid of any emotive attribute. No one defends Aishwarya as funny, kind, goofy, or sweet (or even temperamental and complicated) — except for Rai herself, who has long fronted a giggly, nice girl persona in all her interviews, perhaps in compensation for this lingering silence.
Yet the actress’s best efforts to convince us otherwise have come to nigh, and for good reason. Even the most unfair criticism is bolstered by a very real lacuna of personality that has come to define Rai’s movie career. Her screen presence seems to lack a certain human essence, a signature quality that a great star brings to each of her roles. Rekha, for example, exudes a tempestuous sensuality, whether playing a courtesan, housewife, or matriarch, as opposed to Madhuri Dixit’s effervescent sex appeal, Kajol’s spunky independence or Rani Mukherjee’s girl-next-door sincerity. This unique quality gives nuance, depth, and texture to each of their roles. It makes us, the viewers, both love the character on the screen and the person who makes her real.
“Movies are powerful because they create a sense of intimacy. In the dark confines of the theatre, the viewer feels connected to the actor, begins to feel like he knows him or her,” says film historian Theodore Bhaskaran. With Rai, no such connection is possible because she emits nothing. In each of her films, she is a blank cipher wreathed in perfect clothes and lighting, without the tell-tale, ragged edges of the human presence behind the mask. As Gertrude Stein said famously of the city of Oakland, “There’s no there there.” A reason why one BBC reviewer notes, “the incandescent beauty and artistry of Aishwarya does indeed keep the audience watching, though not necessarily emotionally engaged”. In the place of self is static which she flails to disguise by over-acting. As she rightly boasts, Rai favours character-driven roles, lavish period productions, and talented directors, but more so in the hope that they may help camouflage that lack of affect. Much of the invective hurled at her acting — plastic, robotic, wooden — is but a futile attempt to explain that puzzling absence.
Whether she’s playing a Rajput princess or holding a press conference, Rai’s public avatar is a gleaming, polished surface that deflects all attempts at intimacy. All we’re left with is her undeniable physical perfection, which however eye-popping does not elicit frail, mortal desire. “She’s someone you’d want to behold, not hold. She is like crystal, the finest piece you might find at Swarovski,” says Suri. “But she is all appearance, and the appearance itself overwhelms her and those who look at her so very much that she cannot be allowed to be anything but her appearance.” Yet it’s that flawless, upmarket ‘appearance’ that reflects the true aspiration of new India: to be beheld in speechless admiration. As long as Rai remains picture-perfect, we’ll never tire of looking at her. She is, after all, the prettiest trophy mounted on the walls of our rising, shining India.
(Lakshmi Chaudhry is a Bangalore-based freelance writer)