Sridevi - The Queen of Bollywood

Today in History - Aug 13, 1963

Birth Anniversary

SRIDEVI - The Iconic Bollywood Diva

Sridevi's Original Name
Sridevi was her on-screen name however, her actual name was 'Shree Amma Yanger

The Superstar

With a huge fan base across the world, Sridevi, had been captivating her audience with strong performances for five long decades.


Child Artist

Starting as a child artist, she went on to become one of the best actresses in the industry.

Acting Debut
Sridevi's first movie was 'Thunaivan' in 1969 in which she appeared as a child artist. It was directed by M.A. Thirumugham and Sridevi was only 4 years old at that time. She has also acted as a child artist in the film 'Julie'.


Family Background
Sridevi was born to Ayyapan and Rajeshwari on August 13, 1963 in Sivakasi, Tamil Nadu. Her father was a lawyer. Sridevi has one sister and two stepbrothers.


When she played Rajnikant's Mother
In a 1976 Tamil movie, Moondru Mudichi, Sridevi played the role of Rajinikanth’s stepmother. She was even paid more than Rajnikanth for that role.

Bollywood Debut
Movie Solva Savan released in 1979 was Sridevi's first Bollywood movie and as years passed, she rose as a bollywood superstar.

Rekha dubbed for Sridevi in initial days
Sridevi faced difficulty in speaking Hindi at the start of her bollywood journey since she was from Madras and mostly worked in South Indian movies. So, Rekha dubbed for her in several movies. Another actress Naaz also dubbed for Sridevi in a few movies.

Multilingual Fluency
Sridevi became fluent in Tamil, Telugu, English and Hindi language. The first movie where she dubbed her own dialogues in Hindi was the 1989 'Chandani'.

Sridevi was offered a role in ‘Jurassic Park’
Steven Spielberg offered Sridevi a role in his superhit movie Jurrasic Park in 1993. She refused it as she was at the peak of her Bollywood career and taking break for a Hollywood movie would have disrupted it.

Beta and Darr were offered to Sridevi
Sridevi refused the role in Beta in 1992, since she had already worked with Anil Kapoor in many movies. In 1993, Juhi Chawla bagged the role in movie Darr after Sridevi said no for it.


Sridevi comeback to the Silver Screen
After a career break, she returned with 'English Vinglish' and then 'MOM'. Both movies were critically acclaimed and her grounded performances won her a National Award.

Awards & Honours
Sridevi was honored with Padma Shri by the Government of India in 2013. In the same year, she was voted 'India's Greatest Actress in 100 Years' in a CNN-IBN national poll. Sridevi won five Filmfare Awards for Best Actress in a leading role.


Sridevi died an untimely death in her 50s
On 24 February 2018, Sridevi accidentally drowned due to loss of conciousness in a hotel bathtub in Dubai where she was attending a family wedding. Her last on-screen appearanc
e was in Shah Rukh Khan’s 2018 movie 'Zero'.


Few more intersting facts about her:
  • Sridevi was a complete vegetarian
  • Sridevi used to spell her name as Sreedevi and never really corrected the spelling.
  • While shooting for the song ‘Na Jaane Kaha Se Aayi Hai’ she was down with high fever
  • Sridevi was shooting for 'Lamhe' when her father died in 1991. She lost her mother too in 1995 due to complication during her brain tumor surgery.
  • From 1985 till 1992, Sridevi was the highest-paid Bollywood actress and the first female actor to earn the Superstar title.
  • During her 50 years acting career, she worked in 300 movies
  • Sridevi married producer Boney Kapoor in 1996 in a simple temple wedding. They have two daughters together.
  • She named her daughters Janhvi and Khushi after the names of the heroines in Boney
  • Kapoor’s movies 'Judaai' and 'Hamara Dil Aapke Pass Hai'.
  • Sridevi also did playback singing in movies Sadma, Chandani, Kshana Kshanam, and Garajna.
  • When Sridevi stopped painting, Salman Khan encouraged her to start again. She did and her paintings were acclaimed internationally.b


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