THE POWER OF PRIYANKA

The barrier-breaking actor gets candid about inclusivity, pay parity, body positivity and life with husband Nick Jonas and their baby girl

- ADRIENNE TAM 

When Priyanka Chopra Jonas speaks, you listen. Firstly, there's her unmistakable voice: husky, deep, almost lyrical. Then there are her words. It may be a cliché to call Chopra Jonas worldly, but there's no other way to put it. She's a thinker. She's smart. She doesn't shy away from tough subjects. She wants to change the world.

This isn't to say the 40-year-old doesn't have a sense of humour. While introducing herself at the start of our marie claire interview, the actor laughingly says, "People think I'm serious but I can be pretty goofy. I grew up in India and the States. I have three dogs, one baby and a husband. What else? I'm not someone who likes dessert very much. That's me."

Of course, there's more than that to Chopra Jonas. Born in Jharkhand in India, she moved to Iowa in the United States when she was nearly 13 to live with family. A few years later, she moved back to India and entered the Miss India pageant in 2000, which she won aged 18. At the Miss World pageant that same year, she once again reigned supreme. Several starring roles in Hindi films followed, earning her critical acclaim for her acting.

In 2011, she moved back to the US, and by 2015 had landed the part of Alex Parrish in the TV series Quantico. The role made Chopra Jonas the first South Asian to head up an American network drama series and cemented her as a force to be reckoned with.

Her personal life flourished too. She met musician and fellow actor Nick Jonas after he famously slipped into her DMs in May 2018 and, after falling head over heels in love, Jonas popped the question two months later. They wed in December that year in a lavish and elaborate Hindi wedding held over a number of days. The couple are now parents to daughter Malti Marie, who was born via surrogate in January 2022.