This article has been written and published for South Asian Productions.
The Fame Game is the first release from Dharmatic Entertainment, a subsidiary of Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions. The release of The Fame Game marks the most successful web series venture of Dharma Productions owner, Karan Johar. For over thirty years, Johar has become a staple of the Bollywood film industry, not only through his films under the Dharma Productions banner but also through hosting several Indian television shows such as his very own talk show Koffee With Karan. However, amongst all this, Johar has also been known for “uplifting the already uplifted” through launching star kids, and therefore, fueling nepotism. Johar launched Alia Bhatt and Varun Dhawan in Student of the Year (2012), Janhvi Kapoor in Dhadak (2018), Ananya Pandey in Student of the Year 2 (2019), and soon Shanaya Kapoor with Bedhadak (2022). Johar seems to balance the nepotism crown by helping debut many actors with no film industry connections. However, it is no surprise that while Johar launches star-kids with outsiders to the industry, outsiders fall behind while the star-kids race ahead in their success. Johar has used The Fame Game as a way to segway into the new generation’s fascination with online platforms, which have risen extensively during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Fame Game is a fictional web series that revolves around the disappearance of renowned actress Anamika Anand (Madhuri Dixit) and how her family reacts to her disappearance. The show goes back and forth in time from the ongoing investigation of Anamika’s disappearance to the events leading up to it. However, the more strategically placed plot of the film lies in Anamika’s relationship with her children, especially her daughter, Amara. Amara expresses to her mother that she wants to follow in her footsteps and become an actress just like her. Sound familiar yet? However, what makes this nepotism story arc unique from Karan Johar’s real-life endeavors, is that as the audience, we get to see the emotional motivations behind these star kids, even if it is within a fictional space.
Amara’s internal insecurities are clearly depicted through the expectation to live up to her mother’s legacy. In episode five of the series, after seeing her classmate perform better at a casting call than she did, Amara has a very public breakdown in front of her classmates. Amara expresses her dissatisfaction with her friend receiving a callback instead of herself. Amara also says that she should not experience the disadvantages of not being conventionally attractive because she has the privilege of being Anamika Anand’s daughter. All of this is yelled by Amara, as some of her classmates look at her in awe, and others record her on their phones. Amara has more privilege than her fellow classmates, however, she only sees how disadvantages, rather than her very apparent advantage of being given birthright into this cinematic universe. It feels as if the creators are urging us to sympathize with Amara, yet her public rant comes off as more pretentious about her privilege than it does as endearing. This same privilege is spoken to through the storyline of Anamika’s son, Avinash. Avinash tells Anamika that he wants to go to New York with his friend in order to continue his journey, in what the audience sees as a clear identity crisis. Even though his family is going through a secret financial crisis, the issue of financing his stay in New York does not seem to cross his mind.
Despite the aspect of privilege, the creators are mostly able to get the viewers to sympathize with Amara and Avinash due to their lives being under a constant microscope as a result of the magnitude of Anamika’s stardom. Overall, Johar uses his nepotism crown in order to humanize the idea of Bollywood stardom by showcasing the dark nuances of Anamika’s family as a result of her fame. It is up to the audience to decide whether this show’s story was strategic to Johar’s image in relation to fueling nepotism, or in the show’s case, does fiction remain fiction?
"The Fame Game" is streaming now on Netflix.