The Power Of Priyanka

Priyanka Chopra was already A HUGE FILM STAR IN INDIA when she took on spy thriller Quantico. And with next month’s Baywatch, SHE’S SET TO CONQUER THE WORLD TOO

- Kimberly Cutter 

PRIYANKA CHOPRA DOES NOT BELIEVE IN PLANS. As a teenager, she planned on becoming an aeronautical engineer, but ended up Miss World instead. Not long after, Priyanka planned to go to college, but Bollywood producers persuaded her to try acting. Pretty soon, she’d made more than 50 movies. You’d think she would have learned her lesson, but a few years ago, Priyanka got restless and went to LA with plans to record an album. Instead, she found herself starring in the huge TV show Quantico, with her face plastered all over billboards and buses and YouTube promos.

‘Yeah, plans and me don’t really work out,’ says Priyanka with a throaty chuckle. ‘I’ve learned it’s better to just go with my instincts.’ We’re sitting in Priyanka’s Upper East Side living room in New York City, where she’s currently shooting the second season of Quantico – a fast-paced spy confection in which she stars as gutsy, unstoppable CIA agent Alex Parrish. It’s a miserable January afternoon, but Chez Chopra is a cosy oasis of cream and pale-blue silk in the midst of which sits Priyanka herself, all dark hair, liquid eyes and ripped Levi’s, her tiny new puppy, Diana, dozing on her lap.

At 34, Priyanka is an interesting combination of poise and earthy enthusiasm. Her posture is perfect, her head held high – as if she were still wearing that Miss World crown she won at 18.But her voice is a marvel of huskiness, and when she gets worked up in conversation, she gestures animatedly, like an excited teenager.