‘Fabulous Lives Of Bollywood Wives’ – A Show No One Asked For
Botox, fillers, heels at a beach cleanup, dogs in diapers (yes, you read that right) – I’m not talking about ‘The Real Housewives’ or ‘Keeping Up with the Kardashians’. India now has its very own reality show, ‘Fabulous Lives Of Bollywood Wives,’ which follows the rich wives of some of Bollywood’s actors of yesteryear.
Produced by Dharmatic Entertainment, Netflix’s new reality TV series, ‘Fabulous Lives of Bollywood Wives,’ is everything glamour and drama. Neelam Kothari Soni, Bhavana Pandey, Maheep Kapoor, and Seema Khan have been friends for over 25 years and consider themselves the inner circle of Bollywood. Their husbands, Sameer Soni, Chunky Pandey, Sanjay Kapoor, and Sohail Khan, respectively, are all familiar faces although well past the prime of their acting careers. The ladies have their own careers too – Neelam Kothari and Maheep Kapor are jewelry designers, and Seema Khan and Bhavana Pandey have their own fashion labels. They’re all doting mothers to, dare I say, future Bollywood actors and have busy lives juggling between family, career, and salon appointments.
This show has Karan Johar written all over it. The extravagant lunches in Mumbai, debutante balls in Paris, vacations in Doha, and shopping trips in a Rolls Royce, are all ultra-glamorous but also ultra-unreal. While it is believable that Bollywood wives have an envious life, it is also unnecessary for them to be so pretentious with their SoBo (South Bombay) accents. How their teenage kids who go to school in India don’t even speak Hindi is beyond my comprehension.
This 8-episode series features cameos by the who’s who of Bollywood – Karan Johar (surprise surprise), Malaika Arora, Ekta Kapoor, Janhvi Kapoor, Arjun Kapoor, Ananya Pandey (Bhavana’s daughter), Sidharth Malhotra, and Jacqueline Fernandes, amongst others. The season ends on a high note with everyone at a party at Gauri Khan Designs, hosted by Gauri Khan with a special appearance by Shah Rukh Khan who instantly immerses himself into conversation with the ‘Bollywood wives’ with his charming personality and warm nature.
With the (arguable) exception of SRK’s brief appearance, the show is everything you would hope it would not be. It is scripted, too glamorous to be realistic, and basically a flattering Bollywood edition of The Real Housewives series. If you have gotten through this review and haven’t watched the show yet, you’re not missing much, besides perhaps watching Seema Khan exfoliate her lips with a toothbrush…
