Ill-starred stars

They had fame; they had glitter, they had glamor. They enjoyed celebrity status and were heartthrobs of millions. Their posters adorned the walls of teenagers and their photographs were splashed in glossy magazines. Yet their personal lives were anything but happy and they were haunted by insecurity; their life sometimes ended in tragedy. Some earned millions but ended in abject penury. They married, divorced, and remarried and were tossed up and down in their relationship with the other sex. Here are a few of them whose biography reveals a few pathetic aspects of their lives.Marilyn MunroeThe “Blonde bombshell and sex symbol” made famous by her billowing skirt, did not know who her father was. She was often broke and had posed for nude photographs to earn some money. She had married twice and both marriages had ended in divorce. She struggled with addiction, depression, and anxiety and died at the age of 36 from an overdose of barbiturates.Elizabeth TaylorThe lady with violet eyes who is identified in her role as Cleopatra and rolled out of a carpet in the movie Ceasar and Cleopatra was addicted to alcohol and prescription pain killers. She converted from Christianism to Judaism and her marriages were as brittle as cold ever be and surpassing the record of Henry the VIII she married eight times to seven men. She suffered from skin cancer and being prone to accidents she had to undergo hip-replacement surgery. She had many health problems. She died at the age of 79 of heart failure.MadhubalaCalled Marilyn Munroe of Bollywood and born into a Muslim family she acquired the name Madhubala in filmdom. She suffered from cardiac problems. Her marriage with another actor Kishore Kumar was rocky. She often fought with him and stayed with her father. She died at the age of 36 of an incurable heart problem.N.S. Krishnan and Thyagaraja BhagavatharThey were icons of Tamil cinema and their popularity was phenomenal. Some of the films in which they were starred ran for over three years and still drew crowds. Krishnan was dogged by debts; he lost a lot of money in fighting a criminal case in which Thyagaraja Bhagavathar was a co-accused and which went up to Privy Council of Britain in pre-independence days. He died in penury at his 49th year.