Deepika Padukone - Candid, Self-Aware And Unafraid!

One of Bollywood’s brightest, most glamorous of stars, Deepika Padukone doesn’t hesitate to strip away the sheen, be it playing cover girl without a speck of makeup or championing equal pay and bringing real stories to celluloid. Candid, self-aware and unafraid, the actor has come into her own, finds Moni Mohsin

- Moni Mohsin

I was conflicted about interviewing Deepika Padukone. My only encounter with a Bollywood star some years earlier had been a chilly affair. So how much more icy would be one of the highest-paid actors in Bollywood; winner of a brace of film awards; a fixture on the red carpet at the Met Gala and Cannes; one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world? She’d have handlers galore. She’d clock-watch throughout. I’d chip and chip at the glittering surface and get nothing. And yet, I was intrigued. Her openness about her mental illness, her advocacy of women’s rights, her demand for equal pay ticked all my liberal boxes. I admired her candour, her boldness, her modernity. But still I hesitated. Eventually, I consulted my 20-year-old daughter. “Are you crazy?” she cried.

LEAGUE OF HER OWN

I finally meet Padukone in London, where the Bollywood star is doing a cover shoot. I glimpse clothes racks, lights, a swarm of people in black T-shirts and jeans, and thumping music. I’m told the shoot is ending and they are about to pack up. Meanwhile, a room has been set aside for us upstairs. No sooner have I gone up than Padukone strolls in cradling a mug of tea.

“Sorry to keep you waiting. Shall we go outside?” she gestures to a couple of wicker chairs on the balcony. Padukone is in a blue tracksuit and her hair hangs down her back. She curls into a chair, tucks her bare feet under and sips her tea. Unusually for a film star, she wears not a speck of makeup and yet looks completely at ease. In fact she’s gone makeupfree for this cover shoot—a first for her and Vogue India. Were it not for her staggering beauty she could be the girl next door. I have to remind myself that I’m in the company of a serious player in the often merciless and always exacting world of Bollywood.