Star-kids in the millennium: Glittering or flickering?

The Hindi film industry often falls into controversy for launching star kids. The hype about nepotism apart, in the last few years, even the trend of parents launching their offspring has all but faded out. 

Ranbir Kapoor still leads the star-kid roster. His star-status has been growing every year. 

Kareena Kapoor Khan, Hrithik Roshan, Abhishek Bachchan, Shahid Kapoor and Sonakshi Sinha, apart from being star-kids, are also talented, charismatic, and hardworking. 

Transient fame

Hema Malini-Dharmendra’s daughter, Esha Deol, did make the grade — for a while. The same was true of Rajesh Khanna-Dimple Kapadia’s daughter, Twinkle Khanna (now producer, celebrity author and columnist). Not to forget Shruti and Akshara Haasan (Sarika and Kamal Haasan’s daughters) and Sonam (Anil) Kapoor, Tusshar (Jeetendra) Kapoor and Zayed (Sanjay) Khan. 

New arrivals

The unconventional Junaid (Aamir) Khan made a huge impact with his OTT debut, ‘Maharaj’. Coming up is Aamir’s production with Sridevi’s second daughter, Khushi Kapoor. Khushi (after her debut in The Archies as Betty Cooper) also has Karan Johar’s Naadaniyan and a Tamil film opposite Atharvaa Murali. 

Khushi’s elder sister, Janhvi Kapoor, is racing ahead with one foot firmly planted in the south Indian industry (‘Peddi’, ‘Devara Part One’). Having proved her acting prowess with solo leads like ‘Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl’, ‘Mili’ and ‘Mr & Mrs Mahi’, her talent perhaps comes from her mother.

Suhana Khan, Shah Rukh Khan’s daughter, was Veronica Cooper in ‘The Archies’ and now stars in ‘King’ with dad. But the brightest spot in ‘The Archies’ was Agastya Nanda, the grandson of Amitabh and Jaya Bachchan, who played Archie. His fluid demeanour, easy expressions and carefree body language mark him out as special. Ace director Sriram Raghavan had already signed him for a war biopic, ‘Ekkis’ before his first release.

Jackie Shroff’s son, Tiger Shroff — needs to prove his acting talent too. Chunky Pandey’s daughter Ananya Pandey also hopes to show substance with her next Netflix film, ‘Call Me Bae’. Sara Ali Khan, Saif Ali Khan-Amrita Singh’s daughter, has made it after ‘Simmba’, ‘Zara Hatke Zara Bachke’ and ‘Aye Watan Mere Watan’. Brother Ibrahim Ali Khan has two films in the pipeline, ‘Sarzameen’ and ‘Diler’.

Doing it differently

But in this ‘open’ era, one cannot have closed minds. That seems to be the driving philosophy with some star offspring, and it’s not just about switching to character roles, like Arya Babbar (Raj Babbar) or Vivek Oberoi (Suresh Oberoi) who have received fair success. Namashi Chakraborty, Mithun Chakraborty and Yogeeta Bali’s younger son, made his debut in Rajkumar Santoshi’s ‘Bad Boy’ and is doing two movies with Vikram Bhatt. He is already producing and writing short films and is planning a feature and a series. His elder brother, Mahakshay will act in one of Namashi’s web series and has two more films on hand.

With web-series Inside Edge’ and ‘Code M’, OTT rescued Rati Agnihotri’s son, Tanuj Virwani who is set to play a cop in ‘Murshid’. He is also writing and directing short films. 

Not there yet

Anil Kapoor’s son Harsh Varrdhan Kapoor, Naseeruddin Shah’s Imaad and Vivaan Shah, Aditya Pancholi’s and Zarina Wahab’s son, Sooraj Pancholi, Suniel Shetty’s children Ahan and Athiya Shetty, Raj Babbar’s progeny, Pratiek (from first wife Smita Patil) and Juhi Babbar (from Nadira) are still hunting for fame. 

Sunny Deol’s sons Karan and Rajveer Deol, Poonam Dhillon’s kids Anmol and Paloma Thakeria, Shatrughan Sinha’s son Luv Sinha, Govinda’s daughter, Tina Ahuja, Padmini Kolhapure’s son Priyaank Sharma and Bhagyashree’s kids Abhimanyu Dassani and the hugely-talented Avantika Dassani (‘Mithya’, a web series, the Telugu actioner ‘Nenu Student Sir’) are other examples of those who may not make a mark soon.