DYK: Sridevi was supposed to be in Baahubali

Maharani Srideviji was supposed to be part of ‘Baahubali’, but she ended up losing the role to Ramya Krishna. While scripting the film, SS Rajamouli had his preferred actors in mind in the roles that he was writing about. He had Sridevi in mind for the role of Sivagami, who is the step-mother of Baahubali. Little did Sridevi knew at that time that this movie was going to be the biggest Indian film ever. The price that ice queen, Sridevi, asked was 6 crore, which was even higher than what Prabhas (the film’s hero) was being paid. Maybe Sridevi wanted to use that money to fix her face to look the part. As much as we think she’s a great actress, Ramya is equally talented except her face does not look one tiny bit like Michael Jackson! Now that she is Sivagami, it’s hard to imagine someone else in this role.

Ramya too was hesitant to sign on to play the role of Sivagami because the director had asked her for her bulk dates before they even told her about the film’s story. She refused because she had other commitments, but the makers didn’t give up and requested her to listen to the film’s narration first and then make her decision. After hearing the story, she immediately changed her mind and agreed to come aboard. Ramya charged only 2.5 crore to play the role of Sivagami. There’s a chance Sridevi never wanted to play the role of a mother and grandmother in this film. While Ramya is still acting as part of the supporting cast of the films she does, Sridevi is still the lead actress of her films. Anyways, Sridevi did sign on to play an evil queen in Vijay’s film ‘Puli’, which turned out to be a huge disappointment. There were two actresses in that film, who help keep cosmetic surgeons in business and they are Sridevi and Shruti Haasan. One has talent and screen presence, the other is as good as having a barbie doll in her role.

If you are a Hindi-film audience, you should watch ‘Chaahat’. It’s a Shah Rukh Khan and Pooja Bhatt film, which was released in 1996, and what’s good about this film, aside from its selected good songs, is the performance of Ramya Krishna. That was the first film we watched her in, she was amazing in it as someone with mental trouble or a psycho. Shah Rukh played a poor singer from the village, who loves Pooja’s character, and Ramya was the rich spoilt girl, who gave SRK’s character a chance at singing. Naseerudin Shah played her brother in the film and he’s willing to do anything to keep his sister happy. What made this film worked, even though it was not a hit at the box office, was how the main characters were innocent or at least, appeared to be. You don’t hate Ramya’s character in the film, but end up feeling sorry for her. Check out the song below, which is the first time Shah Rukh’s and Ramya’s characters meet. She heard him sing outside and invited him to her party to perform there.