A girl learns music from her courtesan grandmother and breaks into the burgeoning show business industry of 1930s Bombay, which eventually leads to decades of superstardom as well as romantic entanglements.

Snake Goddess Mansa is having a bad day. It's her birthday but she is restless and irritated by her followers in Naglok. Fortuitously Nagraj turns up and she manages to cajole him into revealing the name of her father, who is none other than Lord Shiva.

An English novelist travels to Bombay to watch one of her novels translated to film. She chases after the movie's leading man while the screenwriter chases after her.

The story of a family troupe of English actors who travel around the towns and villages in India giving performances of Shakespearean plays. Through their travels we see the changing face of India as the old is replaced by the new, Maharajas become hotel owners, sports become more important than culture and the theater is replaced by Bollywood movies. Based on the travels of Geoffrey Kendal with his daughter Felicity Kendal.