Mahira Kakkar

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Mahira Kakkar is a New York-based actress who was born in Calcutta, India. She migrated early to the United States with her family. The name Mahira was given by her grandfather, which is derived from an Urdu word Mahir meaning talented. During her childhood, she dreamt of becoming a ballet dancer, a rock star, or an actor.Mahira first felt the attraction towards the stage when she was 10. She watched the Bolshoi and Kirov ballets in Kolkata and desperately wanted to be a dancer. Her parents took her to every concert in the city even if it was a boring one.She won many prizes in elocution contests in school. Along with this, she is trained in Bharatanatyam dance and Indian classical music. Mahira Kakkars mother.Mahira is a gold medalist in English Literature from Jadavpur University. According to Mahira, this institution encourages its students to stretch their imagination beyond books. Later, Mahira attended The Juilliard School Drama Division in New York City where she worked very hard to be a part of the departments theatrical production, and she boldly addressed the head of the department of Juilliards Drama Division where she said, You have to take me in. You havent seen anything like me yet. Later, she graduated from The Juilliard School Drama Division in New York City and was trained in acting by Harold Guksin. She is also known to be the first person of Indian origin to address The Juilliard School Drama Division.Later, she went on to become part of regional theatres and television throughout her acting career. She played the role of Mrs Rupa Mehra in Netflixs A Suitable Boy (2020). Mahira Kakkar as Mrs Rupa Mehra in Netflixs A Suitable Boy (2020).While she was attending The Juilliard School Drama Division in New York City, Americans found her name difficult to pronounce, so Gillian Jacobs, an American actress, gave her a nickname Mah, which was easier to pronounce than her real name.Having a keen interest in theatres, in January 2013, Mahira worked in the play Clive at The New Group, the play was directed by Ethan Hawke who also acted in the play along with other actors including Vincent DOnofrio and Zoe Kazan. She has also performed in many shows worldwide.It wasnt easy for Mahira to carve a niche for herself in the field of acting, and she became a victim of racism in America while pursuing her acting career. In an interview, while talking about this, she said, Sometimes, its hard to be just the brown girl and not the supermodel brown girl, but nobody said life would be easy. If I get obsessed with ethnic bias issues, wheres the energy to do my work? She never let such problems overpower her interest in acting. She did her work with utter dedication and kept going on. She has an observative and detailed style of acting, to which she said, When I am working on a play, everything I do, becomes about the play..Once, she played the role of Marry in a play, and to get herself prepared for the role, she rushed through plenty of books based on motherhood, parenting, and on war survivors, and she locked herself up in a room where she asked herself, What would be a cause big enough for me to sacrifice the person I value the most?.She has also played some strong women characters in various plays like Viola in Twelfth Night, Emily Webb in Our Town, Juliet in Romeo and Juliet, and Irina in Three Sisters.