After achieving her dreams and being the desi girl in Bollywood a Priyanka Chopra Jonas found herself in Hollywood where after 8 years now she is finally part of the industry and is known for her work. But its not always as easy as it looks as Priyanka recently opened up about her experience of making her way into Hollywood.

“When I got the opportunity to come to America and get representation, I remember the first thing that I had to do was swallow my pride. I had to explain who I was and what I wanted to do. There have been some incredibly prolific Indian actors that have worked in American movies and have done incredible work — like Irrfan Khan, Tabu, Anupam Kher, Amitabh Bachchan — and outside of Indian Americans like Mindy Kaling and Aziz Ansari, there was no precedent for having someone who was an Indian immigrant from outside of the American culture to come in and break global entertainment,” she added. She then made her US debut as a voice actor in Disney’s animated “Planes”. But then In 2015, she landed the starring role in the TV series, “Quantico” and that was the beginning of her fabulous journey to where she is now in Hollywood. 

The actress recalls when she was a teenager watching Sarah Michelle Gellar in “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”, and seeking inspiration from the character. “I was like, ‘That’s who I want to be’. She was an amazing teenage idol. But what if at 13, I had seen someone who looked like me? The only person that I saw at that time who was culturally representative of me was Apu from ‘The Simpsons’, and he was played by a white guy, which I found out much later, obviously. But as a teenager, I didn’t see representation of myself in American pop culture or even global pop culture outside of the stereotypical caricatures of South Asians,” she said. 

Well, maybe back then she had no one to look up to but now every indian girl who wants to make it big sure will have Priyanka as an inspiration. What do you think about our desi girl’s journey? Let us know in the comments below!