I want to be an actress like Rani and PC:Parneeti

Parineeti Chopra on her National Awards honour, dealing with online criticism on her fashion sense, short attention span and stealing from cousin Priyanka Chopra.

How did you feel when when you received the Special Mention honour for Ishaqzaade at the National Awards?

I was in Jodhpur when I started getting some texts from journalists congratulating me. Then my mom called me and said, "What's going on? I'm seeing your name on TV, related to the National Awards." By now I was totally zapped so I called up Karan Johar and he said"badhai ho badhai. You've got a National Award." Then I called up my sister (Priyanka Chopra) and she broke it down for me that it's a Special Mention, a new category for which I'll get a proper award. Of course it all hit me when I was in the hall with all the winners. To get those three seconds with the President and to know that I must have done something right to get this for my first film was a heady feeling. And you know what, I got it on May 3 which was the day when Indian cinema turned 100.

From aspiring to be an investment banker to becoming a Bollywood actor, who has been your godmother on this journey?

I think it was destined and my name means 'destiny' in Hindi. My parents saw Prakash Jha's Parinati and named me after the film. All my life, I used to think actors are famous just because of their looks. I still remember, in London at a train station,when I broke down. I wasn't getting a job because of the recession and it was taking a toll on me. So I called up Priyanka's mom and told her that I'm coming to Mumbai. I came to YRF studios with Priyanka who was shooting Pyaar Impossible. I was offered a job in the marketing cell of YRF and that's when the acting dream began to take shape. I thought of enrolling for acting lessons but then Maneesh Sharma told me, "Don't go to an acting school; I'm taking you for my film." The day after, I resigned and Maneesh offered me Ladies Vs Ricky Bahl. He saw the spark in me and, in a way, Maneesh is my godmother.

Why?

You are better than them.

Originally posted by: MocoCoco

@CPR: I think it's hard for people to like Rani for the same it's hard to lke Sri Devi: Home-wreckers.

But that being said, if she does the kind of roles PC has done then Pari will be here or a long time. PC has done a good job of mixing performance oreinted roles with commercial cinema.

Originally posted by: chocolover89

Nothing wrong with praising Rani, but Pari has now done it in every interview of hers I've read/seen recently. That's when it gets annoying..it's like we get it. Now talk about other things.