Why isn't the Indian audience giving Priyanka Chopra her due for 'Quantico'?

She has been nominated for Favourite Actress In A New TV Series category at the People's Choice Awards. ABC has also extended Quantico for another six episodes, giving the series 19 episodes in total. But Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra is still getting panned in India by many.

The first big debate in India was her accent. Priyanka, as Indian-American Alex Parrish, had to speak with an American accent (obviously).  However, the comments on social media revealed that people here saw it as anything but. The actress had already tweeted how tough it was for her to speak in their twang and that she was stressed about it. Shuttling between the sets of Bajirao Mastani in India and Quantico in the US didn’t help her either.

Alex Parrish is also a woman who has no inhibitions when it comes to having sex even if it’s with strangers in a car. So while on one hand Priyanka was being hailed by people here for making India proud by starring in the ABC series, on another they were also cringing at this ‘act’ of hers (though onscreen). Priyanka herself has stated that shooting the scene was awkward, but the extremely liberal Alex Parrish has offended many conservatives back home.

Though Bollywood was all praise for Pee Cee in Quantico,  the audience here panned her and the show. The comments on social media were unforgiving and scathing. So why can’t the audience accept her as Alex Parrish on Quantico? Pee Cee, being a mainstream Bollywood actor, has for long been entertaining people here by starring in Hindi films with big heroes – she sings, dances and romances and that’s all people have seen and wanted to see. Her move to an American TV show - where she is the protagonist - is surreal for the audience here who can’t accept her as anything more than a Hindi movie glam goddess.

When Aishwarya Rai Bachchan stepped into Hollywood, she also received similar flak like Pee Cee. But the Indian audience has never used this yardstick with actress Freida Pinto, for instance. Why? Because Pinto never acted in mainstream Hindi films! She started off her career in an English film and made a conscious choice not to do commercial Bollywood films. Thus, she is perceived in India as a ‘Hollywood actress’ despite the fact that she is far less popular than Chopra here. The image the audience here has of Pee Cee versus Freida is like chalk and cheese – the pancaked-jatak-matak-gold lehenga wearing-shy but strong woman with OTT acting versus the simple-elegant-sans makeup-performance-oriented actor.

Unfortunately, for Priyanka Chopra (and every other mainstream Bollwyood/ Indian actor who breaks into American TV or films) this is a perception that is going to be tough to break. But does she really need to work on breaking this perception?

The fact is that Chopra is talented and has been recognised and appreciated for who she is and what she has achieved by the international media. She never claimed she could sing like Taylor Swift or act like Meryl Streep or fight like Bruce Lee - all she said is that she is doing Quantico because it’s good TV. For an actress who is at the top in Bollywood to move to television, in America no less, is like an actor starting a new career from scratch. It takes guts and Pee Cee herself must be nervous and anxious as to whether the American audience will accept her and how well she holds up against her colleagues on the show.

Interestingly, Chopra is still seen as an ‘actor of colour’ in Hollywood. But she has managed to break the stereotype that colour matters for a role on American TV. She may be brown-skinned but her role in Quantico is as mainstream as it can get on American TV. That’s what the audience here should be applauding rather than ridiculing her accent, the sex scene or anything else inane.