Originally posted by: diasingh2
Being born in 1992, I also did not get the first hand experience of Sridevi's stardom BUT I did witness a bit of Madhuri mania from 1997 to 1999, as I do retain some blurry memories from this period.
Now based on what I've heard from my parents, family and elderly generation AND based on my personal research & opinion too ---> Sridevi was the bigger star
, especially considering the time-period she was active.
Sridevi had this unique ability to appeal to every demographic be it young men, young women, kids or elderly... basically everyone was in awe of her magnificent screen presence.
and she slowly acquired this capability to effortlessly steal the limelight from her male co-stars.
Sri also had a wider reach because she worked in South Indian films too and was equally popular in that landscape.
Not to mention, she would go on to inspire many 90s actresses who were young during this time-period (Kajol, Urmila etc etc). There's a reason why she is called the "first female superstar" of Indian Cinema.![smiley10](https://www.indiaforums.com/smileys/smiley10.gif)
But unfortunately, Sridevi is mostly remembered as an "80s heroine", which was arguably the worst decade of Indian cinema. In addition to working in some seriously bad films, Sridevi had to compte with Jaya Prada, Meenakshi Sheshadri, Dimple, Amrita Singh and many others right from the begining of her career.
Which is where Madhuri got lucky! She rose to prominence in the 90s when BW started to change.
First of all, Madhuri relied heavily on her sex-appeal and dance in the beginning of her career, which Sridevi (who was deemed her rival) and others clearly lacked.
80s actresses like Jay Prada, Meenakshi etc gradually stopped working actively so Madhuri got to work opposite various actors like Dutt, Shroff, Sunny, Anil, Rishi etc. AND she simultaneously got to work with newcomers like SRK, Aamir, Salman etc. Whereas Sridevi was deemed "too old" to work with newcomers.
Madhuri got even luckier as she was not pitted against even newer batch of 90s actresses like Raveena, Urmila, Kajol, Karisma etc because she was "too senior" for them. Her only true contemporary in the 90s was Juhi who anyways stayed comfortable in her "bubbly" image. Only one young actress who could've given tough competition to both Sri and Madhuri in terms of stardom at that time was Divya Bharti, but she unfortunately died in 93 & her career was cut short.![smiley13](https://www.indiaforums.com/smileys/smiley13.gif)
![smiley28](https://www.indiaforums.com/smileys/smiley28.gif)
Once Madhuri started doing performance-oriented roles like Anjaam/Prem Granth and once Hum Aapke Hain Koun...! happened, there was no looking back for her![smiley32](https://www.indiaforums.com/smileys/smiley32.gif)
...whereas Sridevi's stardom started to fade by then.
With Bollywood going international and so many young directors/filmmakers coming in.. everything sort of worked in Madhuri's favor and she ended up becoming a superstar by the dawn of millennium in her own right, which is great as well. ![smiley32](https://www.indiaforums.com/smileys/smiley32.gif)
She was certainly destined to become one.
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