If I'm playing an Indian in a Hollywood film, I won't do it in any funny Indian accent.

It always seems like coming to my second home whenever I come to Lucknow.

Oh yes, my best birthday gift was when my dad gifted me my first car in college. It was a Maruti Swift. I thought that was the coolest thing ever. It was so much fun, as I could completely show it off to my friends that I have my own car now and not my dad's car.

A lot of people have ridiculous misconceptions about diet and workout routines. It is not about exotic greens and workouts from the western world. It is about what works for you the best.

I have always said that Twitter is my forum to talk to people about what's happening in my life.

I believe in equal pay for equal work. Gender, race, skin colour, or ethnicity should not be the parameters to hire someone or to decide how much they should be paid.

Beauty has no set standard. It is honestly in diversity.

I would like to say this for the record: that I am not trying to lose weight or gain weight. I am just trying to be the best version of myself, and that's really important.

I am blessed to have got a chance to work with directors like Anurag Kashyap, Vishal Bhardwaj, and Nikhil Advani at such an early age.

My father runs a restaurant business in Delhi, so if I had chosen to sell kebabs, it would be far easier for me than for anybody else.

Often, in the movie business, they need somebody who will garner box office because they need to pay for the movie. So the people who are in movies that make a lot of money are the people who most often get cast in studio pictures. In my career, I've never been a box office name.

To me, being creative is a very fragile thing. The environment in which one can create is a very particular one, and somehow, I've always felt the need to be very protective of that.

I found acting when I was 14, when I got cast in the chorus in a high school play, 'The Boyfriend.' In my high school, we did mainly musicals, so I just started doing nothing but musicals for years and loved it.

I think that, initially, I was most passionate about music and particularly about playing the piano. I started playing when I was nine, and I was obsessed with it, really. I wouldn't even go spend the night at a friend's unless they had a piano. But I didn't have the chops, the extraordinary talent to be able to play the piano professionally.

I grew up on a farm. The worst-looking chickens are the best layers. The ones that are the scraggliest... those are usually the ones that are really cooking.

I really would love to take a big break and not be photographed, not perform.

Sometimes it's very difficult to do a movie that's good and then have that movie make it to the light of day.

I'm a leading lady character actor; I don't fit in one slot simply. I've always been used to a certain amount of struggle, and that prepared me wonderfully for a mature age.

I remember that when I was in my 30s, a hot age for an actress, lots of offers were coming in, but nothing was great, and I didn't work for 18 months. It was at a really fruitful age, and I wanted to work. There was nothing coming down the pipeline that I thought was good - and then I got 'The Piano.'

My career has never really been a vertical kind of thing. I mean, it's always been a bit difficult for me.

Most of the time I live a fully anonymous life, which is the way I like it.

I never thought about moving to L.A.; I always wanted to be in New York. I moved there, and now I still have a kind of love affair with the city.

I reveal all of myself. I bring all of myself to my roles. You only see me. You don't see anything else but me. That is who's there. They're manifestations of my own self.

I object to the actual phrase 'Follow me.' You've gotta be kidding! Why would I want to follow anybody else? Nor do I want them to follow me. The machinations of my life, the banalities - they're mine. They belong to me.