In Bloom

As Her Star Steadily Rises, Sonakshi Sinha Is Only Digging in Her Feet Further. The Actor Tells Cheryl-ann Couto She’s Never Felt More Like Herself and More Primed for Success, Just in Time for Her Big 30th Birthday This Month

- Cheryl-Ann Couto

How does a person with over eight million followers on Instagram and Twitter each— all of them watching, judging, adoring, trolling her every move on- and offline— manage to still keep her wits about her? “You turn off your notifications,” says Sonakshi Sinha. This is lesson number one in the Practical Lives of Moviestars, courtesy the newly-minted, maddeningly even, 30-year-old.

 

Sinha ticks all the requisites for superstardom, even if you don’t count her dramatic film-noir beauty. As the daughter of veteran actor Shatrughan Sinha, and with a career that began under the blockbuster friendly auspices of Salman Khan (“I wasn’t asked if I wanted to do Dabangg (2010), I was told I was doing it”), she’s as much an industry insider as it is possible to be. And while a cursory glance at her filmography might not betray it, you need only watch the period drama Lootera (2013) and her last release, Noor, to know she’s also a gifted performer. Then there are those digital legions she commands with her playful, often-spitfire social media persona. And she recently aced that modern day litmus test for celebrity, too: setting off a storm with a single tweet.