Deepika Padukone Biography – an Indian Actress and a Queen of Controversy

Deepika Padukone (born 5 January 1986) is an Indian actress who works in Hindi films. She is one of the highest-paid actresses in India, and her accolades include three Filmfare Awards. She features in listings of the nation’s most popular personalities; Time named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2018 and awarded her the TIME100 Impact Award in 2022.

Padukone, the daughter of the badminton player Prakash Padukone, was born in Copenhagen and raised in Bangalore. As a teenager, she played badminton in national-level championships but left her career in the sport to become a fashion model. She soon received offers for film roles and made her acting debut in 2006 as the title character of the Kannada film Aishwarya. Padukone then played a dual role opposite Shah Rukh Khan in her first Bollywood release, the romance Om Shanti Om (2007), which won her the Filmfare Award for Best Female Debut. Padukone received praise for her starring role in the romance Love Aaj Kal (2009), but this was followed by a brief setback.

The romantic comedy Cocktail (2012) marked a turning point in her career, and she gained further success with starring roles in the romantic comedies Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani and Chennai Express (both 2013), the heist comedy Happy New Year (2014), Sanjay Leela Bhansali‘s period dramas Bajirao Mastani (2015) and Padmaavat (2018), and the Hollywood action film XXX: Return of Xander Cage (2017). She also received critical acclaim for playing a character based on Juliet in Bhansali’s tragic romance Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela (2013) and a headstrong architect in the comedy-drama Piku (2015), winning two Filmfare Awards for Best Actress. She formed her own company Ka Productions in 2018, under which she produced and acted in Chhapaak (2020) and 83 (2021), both of which failed commercially.

Padukone is the founder of the Live Love Laugh Foundation, which creates awareness of mental health in India. Vocal about issues such as feminism and depression, she also participates in stage shows, has written columns for a newspaper, designed her own line of clothing for women, and is a prominent celebrity endorser for brands and products. Padukone is married to her frequent co-star Ranveer Singh.

Early life and modeling career

Padukone was born on 5 January 1986 in Copenhagen, Denmark, in a Saraswat Brahmin family to Konkani-speaking parents. Her father, Prakash Padukone, is a former professional badminton player, and her mother, Ujjala, is a travel agent. Her younger sister, Anisha, is a golfer. Her paternal grandfather, Ramesh, was a secretary of the Mysore Badminton Association. The family relocated to Bangalore, India when Padukone was a year Old. She was educated at Bangalore’s Sophia High School and completed her pre-university education at Mount Carmel College. She subsequently enrolled at the Indira Gandhi National Open University for a Bachelor of Arts degree in sociology, but later dropped out due to scheduling conflicts with her modeling career.

Padukone soon began to receive offers for film roles. Believing herself to be too inexperienced as an actor, she instead enrolled in a course at Anupam Kher‘s film academy. Following much media speculation, the director Farah Khan, who had noticed her in Reshammiya’s music video, made the decision to cast her for a role in Om Shanti Om. Fashion designer Wendell Rodricks also takes credit for helping her get the role. Farah Khan was looking for a model to star in her next film and got in touch with Malaika Arora. Rodricks, for whom Padukone had been modeling for roughly two years then, recommended her to Arora, a close friend of his, who in turn recommended her to Khan in 2007.

Acting career (Deepika Padukone Biography)

Film breakthrough and career struggles (2006–2011)

Padukone announced in 2006 that she would make her film debut with Aishwarya, a Kannada film directed by Indrajit Lankesh. The romantic comedy was a remake of the Telugu film Manmadhudu, and she was cast in the title role opposite the actor Upendra. The film proved to be a commercial success. RG Vijayasarathy of Rediff.com was appreciative of Padukone’s screen presence but added that “she needs to work on her emotional scenes.” By the end of 2006, Farah Khan’s Happy New Year was shelved, and Khan had instead cast Padukone for the melodrama Om Shanti Om (2007). Set against the backdrop of the Hindi film industry, the film tells the story of a struggling actor in the 1970s who dies soon after witnessing the murder of the woman he loved and is reincarnated to avenge her death. Shah Rukh Khan starred as the protagonist, and Padukone featured in dual roles as a leading actress of the 1970s, and later, an aspiring actress. In preparation for her role, Padukone watched several films by actresses Helen and Hema Malini to study their body language. Her voice was dubbed by the voice artist Mona Ghosh Shetty. For one of the songs in the film, “Dhoom Taana,” Padukone drew upon Indian classical dance, and according to Dorling Kindersley, “mesmeriz[ed] audiences” by using hasta mudras (hand gestures). Om Shanti Om was a commercial success, and emerged as the highest-grossing film of the year, with a global revenue of ₹1.49 billion (US$19 million). Taran Adarsh of the entertainment portal Bollywood Hungama opined that she had “all it takes to be a top star”, and she was awarded the Filmfare Best Female Debut Award and received her first Filmfare Award for Best Actress nomination. Bollywood Hungama reported that the success of Om Shanti Om proved a breakthrough for her.

Padukone began 2011 with an item number in Rohan Sippy’s Dum Maaro Dum. She referred to it as “the wildest song any actress has done;” the song’s sexual content attracted controversy including a court case for indecency. Her next film was Prakash Jha‘s socio-political drama Aarakshan, which dealt with caste-based reservations in India. Trade journalists had high expectations for the film which ultimately flopped at the box office. Critical reaction was largely negative, though Pratim D. Gupta mentioned Padukone as the most “refreshing thing” about it. Her final appearance that year was in Rohit Dhawan’s comedy-drama Desi Boyz alongside Akshay Kumar, John Abraham, and Chitrangada Singh, a role that failed to propel her career forward. The series of poorly received films led critics to perceive that Padukone had “[lost] her sparkle.”

Establishing as a leading lady (2012–2015)

Padukone has said that her starring role in the 2012 Homi Adajania-directed romantic comedy Cocktail marked a significant turning point in her career. Raja Sen of Rediff.com opined that she had successfully proved to be a “stunning girl who can also act.” Set in London, Cocktail tells the story of a man’s relationship with two temperamentally different women—an impulsive party girl (Veronica, played by Padukone) and a submissive girl next door (Meera, played by Diana Penty). During the script narration, the producer Dinesh Vijan offered Padukone the choice of which woman to play; she decided on Veronica to expand her horizons as an actress. Portraying the role was a creative and physical challenge for her, and to achieve the physical requirements of her character she exercised extensively and followed a rigorous diet. Critics were divided in their opinion of the film, but particularly praised Padukone’s performance; Devesh Sharma of Filmfare credited her as the “soul of the film” and wrote that she “excels in every scene, whether as a material girl who enjoys sex, drugs and rock and roll or as the jealousy rode girl out to destroy herself.” Cocktail earned Padukone Best Actress nominations at several award ceremonies, including Filmfare, Screen, and IIFA. The film also proved to be a box-office success.

Later in 2015, Padukone played the part of a businessperson who helps Ranbir Kapoor‘s character overcome his conflicts in Imtiaz Ali’s romantic drama Tamasha. Despite poor financial returns, Sukanya Verma of Rediff.com named Padukone’s performance as the best by an actress that year, writing that she “is so potent in Tamasha, it’s almost as if you can hear her heartbeat across the screen”. In her final release of 2015, Padukone reunited with Sanjay Leela Bhansali and Ranveer Singh in Bajirao Mastani, a historical drama about a tragic extramarital affair. Singh was cast as the Maratha general Bajirao I, while Priyanka Chopra and Padukone were featured as his first and second wives, respectively. To play the warrior-princess Mastani, Padukone learned sword-fighting, horse-riding, and the martial art form of kalaripayattu. With a revenue of over ₹3.5 billion (US$44 million), Bajirao Mastani proved to be the fourth highest-grossing Bollywood film of the year. Anupama Chopra found Padukone “riveting”, but Subhash K. Jha thought that she was “way too subtle and silken, and not steely enough”. The film was showcased at the International Film Festival of India; at the 61st Filmfare Awards, Bajirao Mastani was named Best Film and Padukone received her second Best Actress nomination that year.

Professional expansion (2017–present)

The action film XXX: Return of Xander Cage (2017), in which Padukone played the lead female role of Serena Unger, opposite Vin Diesel, marked her first project in Hollywood. The critical reception of the film was mixed. Tirdad Derakhshani of The Philadelphia Inquirer termed the film a “repetitious heap of remarkably tedious CGI-enhanced action scenes” and thought that Padukone’s talent was wasted in it. Conversely, Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter believed that she had successfully “outclassed” Diesel to “practically [steal] the film”. The film earned over US$345 million worldwide, a majority of which came from the Chinese box office. Padukone received three nominations at the Teen Choice Awards and followed it with an item number in the romantic drama Raabta.

Padukone’s next production venture was 83 (2021), a sports drama about India’s victory at the 1983 Cricket World Cup, starring Ranveer Singh as Kapil Dev, in which she also took on the role of Dev’s wife, Romi. The film was delayed several times chiefly due to the COVID-19 pandemic in India. Padukone was director Kabir Khan’s first choice as he considered casting a real-life couple as an onscreen pair to be a good marketing strategy. Reviews for the film were positive, with Davesh Sharma of Filmfare commending Padukone for adding glamour to her supporting part. It failed to perform well commercially. Padukone next took on a leading role in Shakun Batra’s Gehraiyaan (2022), a drama about infidelity which was released on Amazon Prime Video. In a mixed review of the film, Siddhant Adlakha of IndieWire noted that it allowed Padukone “the room to create something more emotionally complex than the Hindi mainstream” and commended her for making her character’s troubles seem “subtle yet palpable”.

Upcoming projects

Padukone will next reunite with Shah Rukh Khan for Yash Raj Films’ action film Pathan. She will star opposite Prabhas in an as-yet-untitled science fiction film from filmmaker Nag Ashwin, and star and produce in a remake of the American comedy film The Intern. She will also star in Siddharth Anand’s action film Fighter, alongside Hrithik Roshan, and will portray Draupadi in a retelling of the Mahabharata from her character’s perspective, which she will also produce. She was a jury member for the 2022 Cannes Film Festival.

Personal life (Deepika Padukone Biography)

Padukone shares a close bond with her family and visits them regularly in her hometown of Bangalore. She lives in Prabhadevi, a neighborhood in Mumbai, and has admitted to missing the presence of her parents there. A practicing Hindu, Padukone considers religion to be an important aspect of her life and makes frequent visits to temples and other religious shrines.

While filming Bachna Ae Haseeno in 2008, Padukone began a romantic relationship with co-star Ranbir Kapoor. She spoke openly about the relationship and sported a tattoo of his initials on the nape of her neck. She has said that the relationship had a profound effect on her, transforming her into a more confident and social person. The couple broke up a year later; she professed in an interview to feeling betrayed for a long time. In a 2010 interview, Padukone accused him of infidelity, and Kapoor later admitted to it. They reconciled their friendship while working on Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani.

Padukone subsequently became reticent to discuss her personal life, but in 2017, she fondly spoke of her relationship with her frequent co-star Ranveer Singh, whom she began dating in 2012. In November 2018, the couple married in traditional Konkani and Sindhi ceremonies at Lake Como, Italy.

Off-screen work

In addition to acting, Padukone has written opinion columns and has been involved with women’s health and fitness magazines. She has also supported charitable organizations and has performed for stage shows. In 2009, she was hired by Hindustan Times to write weekly columns for their lifestyle section; through these columns, she interacted with her fans and passed on details of her personal and professional life. That year, she participated in the World 10K Bangalore marathon, which raised ₹13.1 million (US$160,000) in support of 81 NGOs. In 2010, Padukone adopted the Maharashtrian village of Ambegaon as part of NDTV’s Greenathon Campaign, to provide the village with a regular supply of electricity. She visited Indian jawans (troops) in Jammu, for an Independence Day special episode of NDTV’s reality show Jai Jawaan.

In 2020, Padukone attended a protest for students who were brutalized during the 2020 JNU Attack due to their protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act. Members of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party criticized her decision and asked people to boycott her film Chhapaak. Many others praised her for standing up against a crackdown on dissent, as mainstream Bollywood actors avoid making political statements fearing backlash and consequences on their films.

In the media (Deepika Padukone Biography)

The journalist Vir Sanghvi, in 2013, described Padukone as “strong, someone who makes up her own mind, [and] has motivation within herself.” She is particularly known in the media as a professional, disciplined performer, whose “work takes precedence over everything else”. A reviewer for Rediff.com described her personality as “simple,” “grounded,” and “accessible,” and wrote, “She takes criticism in her stride, acknowledges her limitations, and strives to work hard at getting better. She handles praise with equal composure.” Ayan Mukerji (the director of Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani) considers her to be “a woman who will flirt with you but you will love to take her home to meet your mom as well”. Padukone has maintained a Twitter account since 2010 and launched an official Facebook page in 2013. She is the most followed Asian woman on Twitter.

Padukone is an active endorser for several brands and products, including Tissot, Maybelline, Coca-Cola, and L’Oreal Paris, among others. In 2014, Business Standard reported that Padukone earned ₹50 million (US$630,000) to ₹60 million (US$750,000) per endorsement deal and TAM AdEX named Padukone the most visible face on television in India that year. Duff & Phelps estimated her brand value to be US$102.5 million, in 2018, the second highest of Indian celebrities. In 2020, she became the first Indian actor to campaign for the fashion company Louis Vuitton. In the same year, Padukone was criticized for a TikTok video aimed towards the promotion of her film Chhapaak, in which she asked users to recreate her “acid-attack survivor look” from the film which was deemed “insensitive” and “disrespectful” to acid-attack victims. Later that year, Padukone was among several Bollywood actors who were criticized for posting Instagram messages showing solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, despite their previous work advertising skin-lightening products which perpetuate colorism.

Accolades (Deepika Padukone Biography)

Padukone has been the recipient of three Filmfare Awards: Best Female Debut for Om Shanti Om (2007), and two Best Actress awards for Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela (2013) and Piku (2015).

Asian Film Awards

The Asian Film Awards are presented annually by the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society to recognize the excellence of those in the Asian film industry. Padukone has received two nominations.

BIG Star Entertainment Awards

The BIG Star Entertainment Awards is an annual event organized by the Reliance Broadcast Network. Padukone has won six awards from sixteen nominations.

Filmfare Awards (Deepika Padukone Biography)

The Filmfare Awards is one of the oldest and most prominent Hindi film award ceremonies. They are presented annually by The Times Group to honor both artistic and technical excellence. Padukone has won three awards from 10 nominations.

Indian Film Festival of Melbourne

The Indian Film Festival of Melbourne (IFFM) is an annual Indian film festival based in Melbourne, Australia. It is presented by Film Victoria and the State Government of Victoria and produced by Mind Blowing Films, a Melbourne-based distributor of Indian cinema across Australia and New Zealand. Padukone has received four nominations.

Screen Awards (Deepika Padukone Biography)

The Star Screen Awards is a yearly ceremony honoring professional excellence in the Hindi language film industry. Padukone has won ten awards from sixteen nominations.

Stardust Awards (Deepika Padukone Biography)

The Stardust Awards are presented by Stardust magazine. They honor professional excellence in the Hindi film industry. Padukone has won three awards from thirteen nominations.

International honors and media titles

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