In one of those strokes of luck that most mortals keep wistfully hoping for, Leone showed up in a tub, all a-glisten, splashing and warbling, and has since risen, Venus-like. The faintly philosophical question she flung out was capped definitively by her declaring that this duniya may be pittal di, but she was ‘Babydoll, main soney di’.
The song was a smash hit, and catapulted Leone into the slimly-populated category of performers that movie-makers lust after. You can put them in a sack, and yet they are magnets. It helped, too, that Leone was already infamous before she hit Mumbai. As a 24-carat porn star, who had made a name for herself in the most notoriously exploitative industry in the world, Leone was positioned in a million men’s (and women’s) fantasies. She was freely available: all you had to have was a net connection and an appetite.
The question now is: can she become an A-list Bollywood leading lady? Or will she be forever consigned to have-Sunny-will-get-her-to -show-skin corner?
At this moment, there are no clear answers. She is one of the most searched names on search engines, and she has just outed herself in a film in which she is the node. The males revolve, satellite-like, around her. But Ek Paheli Leela is as much a roster of Leone’s weaknesses as her strengths: her jaw-dropping assets are on abundant display, but so are her severely limited acting skills.
The film, which has no merit other than its heroine’s stunning figure, has found enough takers (going by the first weekend collections). Will this lead to a glut in which she continues to get stuffed into costumes and play peekaboo? Like other risk-averse mainstream film industries, Bollywood hates experimenting. If skimpy outfits can reel them in, why bother with a plot? She can continue to do what she does best. Why be ambitious and try for more?
But looking at Leone, and the spark of potential that lurks underneath all that glossy skin, you wish that someone would get her to work on herself. Which would entail not just making sure there is no flab on the abs, but also focus upon learning how to emote. To be a star who can also act is hard work.
Her skilling up, if she can do it, will be useful because there’s a slot of the sexy-funny girl left wide open in Bollywood. You can go back, for a template, to Mumtaz, whose snub nose just added to her sexiness, and who could be a hoot. More recently, for a while, i looked like Mallika Sherawat would be the one: Pyaar Ke Side Effects is one of those rare films that used its leading lady’s sexiness smartly, in a story that remains fresh and relatable.
But Ms Sherawat was lured away by the false attractions of the global stage. Her attempt at becoming a big-ticket Bollywood export has failed, leaving her in sundry hard-won red carpet appearances in Cannes: she is now trying to come back, but her choice of films has been dodgy. Last seen (Dirty Politics), she was letting dirty old men nibble her ears, not to any avail.
There is hope, however. Because if Katrina Kaif, who first appeared in the pulpy-squelchy Boom, can make it, why can’t Leone? They had the same attributes, starting out. Leggy lasses with a willingness to reveal will always find a place in the movies, but Kaif’s trajectory, via these no-account parts to becoming powerful male stars’ arm candy on and off screen, to a star in her own right, at least as far as expensive endorsements go, has been impressive.
But Kaif is still very far from greenlighting movies on her own steam, remaining a major contender for filling in leading lady slots in male super-starry vehicles. Within three years of her debut, Leone is in a film which she toplines: the flick may be ghastly, but it is out there.
Does this mean the audiences are ready to look anew at a woman who has never hidden her “adult entertainer” past? Indian viewers, even now, can be as hidebound as those who make mass movies: can we, misogynistic and sexist to the hilt, move past the images of a nude Leone in her earlier avatar, and accept her as a “respectable” leading lady?
That she can conceivably be asked to endorse prophylactics (scented or ribboned or flavoured?) is a no-brainer. Can she also sell cellphones and wholesome mango drinks? Can she dare to adopt the fully-clothed route?
To twist the tagline a bit: is she ready? And even more importantly: are we?
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