“It’s so normalized that it doesn’t come up in conversation.”
Priyanka Chopra’s memoir Unfinished will be released tomorrow, and she’s already been opening up about the stories she tells in the book.
In an interview with Metro UK, the actor elaborated on an anecdote in Unfinished where, after winning the Miss World beauty pageant in 2000, a film director told her to get a “boob job.”
Jon Kopaloff / Getty Images
“After a few minutes of small talk, the director/producer told me to stand up and twirl for him,” she wrote in the book. “I did. He stared at me long and hard, assessing me, and then suggested that I get a boob job, fix my jaw, and add a little more cushioning to my butt.”
“If I wanted to be an actress, he said, I’d need to have my proportions ‘fixed,’ and he knew a great doctor in LA he could send me to. My then-manager voiced his agreement with the assessment.”
“I left the director/producer’s office feeling stunned and small. Was he right that I couldn’t be successful unless I had so many body parts ‘fixed’? I thought of how individuals in the media and others in the industry had referred to me as ‘dusky’ and ‘different-looking,’ and I wondered if I was cut out for this business after all.”
Prodip Guha / Getty Images
“It’s so normalized that it doesn’t come up in conversation,” Chopra reflected to Metro UK about the treatment she received. “I talked about a movie that I walked out of because of how I was spoken to by the director. It was early in my career, but I never told him why I walked out.”
“I never had the courage to stand up for myself, and actually admit it. Because I heard so often, ‘Don’t be a nuisance, you’re new in the industry, you don’t want to have a reputation that you cause trouble or you’re not easy to work with.'”
“Now on the other side of 35. I know that’s a normalized thing that girls hear so often. I fell for it too, even though I consider myself a forward-thinking, smart girl. I learned from that over time, but at that time, I was terrified.”
“Yes, I faced that then, I faced that like everybody else when you’re in patriarchal industries, which ours has been for a very long time.”
Chopra will be sharing more of her experiences and wisdom when Unfinished hits shelves.
BuzzFeed Daily
Keep up with the latest daily buzz with the BuzzFeed Daily newsletter!
