Now comes Sridevi 2

Sequels have made smash hits into huge franchises. Batman, Spiderman, Superman... man man man! Now, welcome the biggest sequel to the smashest hit woman of Indian cinema. Sridevi-2.
While Gauri was busy writing and directing English Vinglish, I was serving coffee, watching Sri perform and thinking to myself about the concept of human franchise. What does it take an actor to be a phenomenon? And a phenomenon 2?
It’s actually very very simple.Anybody can be Sridevi. Here’s how. Be born with ACT+ blood group. Start acting at the age of 3 or max 4. Preserve your basic intelligence at all costs. Don’t complicate instinct with too much knowledge. Love acting. Keep acting. Don’t analyse your gift. Grow up. Forget birthdays. Adjust your dates between Rajinikanth, Kamal Haasan, NTR, Nageshwara Rao, Chiranjeevi....etc etc. Between all the dancing, jumping and after every fifth commercial blockbuster, slam the audience with a breathtakingly sensitive performance or through divine comic timing. Have the courage of conviction to turn the north into the south. Do the same things... follow the same rules and conquer the rest of the country. Command a price equal to the country’s top heroes and command the respect given to the country’s finest actors. Be right on top. And stop. Get married to a man with a heart the size of Punjab. Allow luck to play a part in your life for once and introduce yourself to somebody as wonderful as Boney. Have two gorgeous little daughters. Go to the market everyday, buy fish personally and put all your energies to produce a film called family. Just be on a broccoli diet while they feast. Watch movies everyday for 14 years. Love everybody. Be a simple human nobody. Out of the blue, one day, accidentally, feed a bearded man and his wife some fantastic south Indian food.
Like the wife more. Listen to a story. And ask “When are we starting?”
Steps to be an astronomical human franchise. Sridevi 2. After just 15 years. Bigger. Better. Younger.
English Vinglish, produced by R Balki and Eros International, releases today.