Jacqueline Fernandez is the fifth guest on Pinkvilla's Woman Up and she completely suits the title 'Imperfectly Perfect'. A beauty pageant winner from Sri Lanka, Jackie decided to try her luck in Bollywood and shifted base to Mumbai. But little did she know what she was getting into. Muddled into a world of underlying darkness below the glitzy showbiz, she soon faced the wrath of the industry. From being bodyshamed to being made to feel different, she had it all.
While some asked her to change her name, many asked her to get a nose job done. She says, "It's been about 10 good years. The craziest thing was that when I came here, I never thought how to stand out or do things differentluy. I just wanted to be me. So, I didn't put an act! People told me, 'Do a nose job, change your name'. I was like, 'is all this really needed?'I was calm, relaxed and colected about it. It worked out for me."
She further adds, "I would actually laugh though. I was told to change my name to Muskaan. My agency had these suggestions: Should we change her name because Jacqueline Fernandez is too western. How do we crack the industry with such a name? I was sure I'm not changing my name. People used to tell me I have to be a certain way. They wanted me to make my eyebrows darker. And the one feature of mine which I loved since childhood was my nose and then, someone asks me to change my nose."
In a country that celebrates the eternal proverb 'Atithi Devo Bhava', she found herself in the middle of judgment when she wasn't even given a house on rent. Why? Because she was a 'firang actress'. She also reveals that it's not just the people outside, but people from within the industry too, ridiculed her for her accented Hindi and felt 'she was trying too hard' to fit in. All this and more in an explosive tell-all interview.
Watch the video right here:
