Padma Lakshmi extracted from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia, distributed under the GNU Free Documentation License

Padma Lakshmi
Padma Lakshmi at opening night of the Metropolitan Opera, 25 September 2006.
Birth name	Padma Parvati Lakshmi
Date of birth	September 1, 1970 (1970-09-01) (age 38)
Height	5' 9"
Hair color	Black
Eye color	Brown
Measurements	36C - 23 - 35
Weight	125 lbs
Official website

Padma Parvati Lakshmi, Lady Rushdie ^[1] (born September 1, 1970) is an Indian American cookbook author, actress, and former model who has described herself as the first well-known model from India.^[2] She has been the host of the reality television program Top Chef since season two.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Early life 1.2 Education 2 Career 2.1 Modelling 2.2 Movies and television 3 Awards 3.1 Cookbooks 4 Personal life 5 Selected filmography 6 Notes 7 References 8 External Links

Biography

Early life

Padma was born in the state of Kerala, India, on September 1, 1970, though she grew up in Madras, Tamil Nadu. However, Padma spent most of her adolescent life in the United States.

Her parents' only child together, Lakshmi is the daughter of an executive with Pfizer and his first wife, Vijaya,^[3] a nurse who presently specializes in suicide prevention.^[2] Her parents separated when she was one and divorced a year later. Both parents later remarried; her mother's third and present husband is a plumber.^[4]

When she was 14 years old, she was involved in a serious automobile accident, causing an injury of her right arm, which required surgery leaving a 7 inch scar,^[2] between her elbow and shoulder. The accident happened on a Sunday afternoon on her way back with her parents from a Hindu temple in Malibu. She remembers a loud bang, looking out the windshield and realizing the family's red Mercury Sedan was airborne. Padma describes the event in the Vogue-April 2001 edition as "Flying in a car felt like an exhilarating hallucination, an unbelievable ride that oddly remains one of the most beautiful images in my memory." The car flew 40 feet down an embankment directly into a tree. The tree trunk fell directly on top of the car. She remained conscious, covered in glass, for the 40 minutes it took for the paramedics and firefighters to get through the traffic. They used the "jaws of life" to extract the family from the crumpled car. A helicopter landed in the middle of the highway to air lift her parents away while an ambulance carried Padma to the hospital. Fortunately, everyone survived. Her injuries included a fractured right hip and a shattered upper right arm which resulted in her famous 7-inch scar.

By a later marriage of her father's, Lakshmi has a half-brother and a half-sister, who was an actress and classical dancer but is now pursuing a career with special-needs children.^[4] As Lakshmi said in an interview published in The Guardian, "My father had quit his job as an executive at Pfizer to manage her career. That was kind of like rubbing salt in the wound. I didn't understand why he wanted that relationship with her, and not with me."^[2]

Education

Lakshmi is a 1992 graduate of Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, USA, where she received a B.A. with honors in Theatre Arts.^[5].

Lakshmi was brought up as a vegetarian^[6] and has admitted that because of this, she sometimes becomes "squeamish" when sampling other cultural delicacies. ^[7]

Career

Modelling

Lakshmi's career began at age 20, when she was discovered by a modelling agent in Spain while sitting in a café.^[2] As she has stated, “I was the first Indian model to have a career in Paris, Milan and New York. I’m the first one to admit that I was a novelty.”^[4] Despite Lakshmi's comment about her being a pioneer as a model of Indian descent, her career follows in the footsteps of Persis Khambatta, a former Miss India, who modelled for Revlon.

She has modelled for top designers such as Emanuel Ungaro, Ralph Lauren, and Alberta Ferretti and done ad campaigns for Roberto Cavalli and Versus.^[8] She was a favorite model of the photographer Helmut Newton, whose photographs of her often highlighted the large scar on her right arm.

She has appeared on the magazine covers of Cosmopolitan - January 2002 ^[9], L'Officiel India - October 2004, ^[10],^[11] – December 19, 2004, ^[12] - Spring 2005, ^[13] - October 2005, Newsweek - March 6, 2006^[14], ^[15] Asian Woman– May/June 2006, ^[15] Avenue - July/August 2006, and ^[16] Industry - February/March 2007.

Movies and television

Lakshmi had a comical supporting role as the lip synching disco singer Sylk in the 2001 American movie Glitter with Mariah Carey. She co-starred with Amitabh Bachchan and Jackie Shroff in the 2003 Hindi action box office failure^{citation needed} Boom as Shiela Bardez, one of a trio of super models accused of stealing diamonds. Lakshmi was last seen on screen as Geeta with Aishwarya Rai and Dylan McDermott in Paul Mayeda Berges' 2005 film The Mistress of Spices. She will be starring^{citation needed} in Oscar-nominated director Deepa Mehta's upcoming 2007 film, Kamagata Maru which was earlier titled Exclusion.

Padma Lakshmi made a 2002 guest appearance as alien princess Kaitaama in Precious Cargo, the 37th episode of the science fiction TV series Star Trek: Enterprise. She was also hostess of Domenica In, Italy's top-rated television show.^{citation needed} She portrayed Sean Bean's nemesis in the 2004-2005 iTV TV series Sharpe's Challenge. In 2006 Lakshmi appeared in ABC's TV series The Ten Commandments with Dougray Scott, Naveen Andrews, and Omar Sharif. She took over as hostess of the popular TV cooking competition series Top Chef in 2006 during its second season and has continued in its third and fourth seasons.

Awards

Lakshmi was named number 66 on AskMen.com's "The Top Most Desirable Women of 2008" list.

Cookbooks

Her first cookbook Easy Exotic was awarded Best First Book at the 1999 World Cookbook Awards at Versailles. She was host of the Food Network series, Padma's Passport, which is part of the larger series Melting Pot, in 2001. She has also been a guest host on parts of the British culinary tourism show Planet Food, hosting the segments on India and Spain.^[17] Her second cookbook Tangy, Tart, Hot and Sweet was released October 2, 2007^[18].

Personal life

On April 17, 2004, in New York City, Lakshmi married the novelist Salman Rushdie, to whom she was introduced at a party hosted by the journalist and editor Tina Brown^[3]. On July 2, 2007 the couple filed for divorce, shortly after Rushdie was granted a knighthood.^[19] She is the model for one of the central characters -- and love interests -- in Rushdie's novel, Fury (a novel dedicated to her as well).

When questioned about Rushdie's age (he is seven years younger than her father) and her long estrangement from her father (whom she has described as "the most sexy, manic, in-shape, lean, tall, handsome man I have ever met"), Lakshmi has said that there may be a correlation: “I think that we are attracted to what we feel we need."^[20]

Selected filmography

1994	Unzipped	Documentary (High Fashion)	Herself
1997	Linda e il brigadiere  ep: "Il fratello di Linda"	TV Series (Italian, Comedy)	"Indian Lady"
1998	Il Figlio di Sandokan	TV Series (Italian, Drama)	N/A
1999	Caraibi	TV Series (Italian, Adventure)	Malinche
2000	Planet Food	Documentary (Cooking)	Host
2001	Glitter	Film (US, Drama)	Sylk
2001	Melting Pot: Padma's Passport	TV Series (US, Cooking)	Host
2002	Star Trek: Enterprise  ep: Precious Cargo	TV Series (US, Sci-Fi)	Kaitaama
2003	Boom	Film (Indian, Drama)	Shiela Bardez
2005	The Mistress of Spices	Film (Indian, Drama)	Geeta
2006	The Ten Commandments	TV Series (US, Biblical)	Princess Bithia
2006	Sharpe  ep: Sharpe's Challenge	TV Movie (Action/History/War)	Madhuvanthi
2006	Top Chef 2	TV Series (US, Reality/Cooking)	Host
2007	Top Chef 3	TV Series (US, Reality/Cooking)	Host
2008	Top Chef 4	TV Series (US, Reality/Cooking)	Host

Notes

References

• Padma Lakshmi article at Memory Alpha, a Star Trek wiki
• Padma Lakshmi official website
• Padma's Blog
• Padma Lakshmi's Roots
• Padma Lakshmi at the Internet Movie Database
• Padma Lakshmi's MySpace
• Top Chef Website
• Padma Lakshmi on YouTube
• Article about Padma Lakshmi in Tango Magazine website

External Links

• Padma Lakshmi's Guest DJ Set on KCRW KCRW Guest DJ Set

Persondata
NAME	Padma Parvati Lakshmi
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Lady Rushdie
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Indian actress, model
DATE OF BIRTH	September 1, 1970
PLACE OF BIRTH	Chennai, India
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH