Priyanka Chopra has spoken out about a “dehumanising” moment when an unnamed Bollywood film director asked to see her underwear on set.
While speaking about the initial days of her career as an actor, the 40-year-old highlighted a very uncomfortable situation that she faced.
“This may have been 2002 or 2003” Chopra said during an interview with The Zoe Report. “I’m undercover, I’m seducing the guy – obviously that’s what girls do when they’re undercover. But I’m seducing the guy and you have to take off one piece of clothing [at a time].
“I wanted to layer up [but] the filmmaker was like, ‘No, I need to see her underwear. Otherwise why is anybody coming to watch this movie?’” the Citadel star recalled.
“He didn’t say it to me,” Chopra added. “He said it to the stylist in front of me. It was such a dehumanising moment. It was a feeling of, ‘I’m nothing else outside of how I can be used, my art is not important, what I contribute is not important.’”
The Quantico star said that she walked off the film two days later and at her father’s urging, she paid back the production for what they’d spent on her out of her own pocket.
“I just couldn’t look at [the director] every day,” she said.
In March, Chopra also revealed the details of the main reason she left Bollywood.
During an appearance on Dax Shepherd’s podcast Armchair Expert, Chopra said: “I was being pushed into a corner in the [Bollywood] industry.
“I had people not casting me, I had beef with people, I am not good at playing that game so I kind of was tired of the politics and I said I needed a break,” she said.
