Padma Lakshmi
| Padma Lakshmi | |
|---|---|
Lakshmi at the 2008 Tribeca Film Festival
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| Native name | Tamil: பத்மா பார்வதி லக்ஷ்மி வைத்யநாதன் |
| Born |
Padma Parvati Lakshmi Vaidynathan September 1, 1970 Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India |
| Citizenship | American |
| Occupation | Model, author, actress, TV host |
| Years active | 1988–present |
| Children | 1 |
| Modeling information | |
| Height | 5 ft 9 in (1.75 m) |
| Hair color | Black |
| Eye color | Brown |
Padma Lakshmi (pronounced [ˈpəd̪maː ˈləkʃmiː], பத்மா லக்ஷ்மி; born Padma Parvati Lakshmi Vaidynathan; September 1, 1970) is an Indian-born American author, actress, model, television host and executive producer. Her debut cookbook Easy Exotic won her the "Best First Book" award at the 1999 Gourmand World Cookbook Awards. She has been the host of the US reality television program Top Chef since season two in 2006, for which she received a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Host for a Reality or Reality-Competition Program. In 2010, Top Chef won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Reality-Competition Program. Her debut memoir Love, Loss and What We Ate was released on International Women's Day, March 8, 2016.
Padma Parvati Lakshmi Vaidynathan was born in Chennai, India. Her father was a Pfizer executive, and her mother, Vijaya, is a retired nurse who specialized in oncology. Her parents divorced when she was 2, and both parents later remarried. Lakshmi is her mother's only child, but she has a younger paternal half-brother and half-sister. The latter formerly worked as an actress and classical dancer but is now pursuing a career working with children with special needs. In an interview in The Guardian, Lakshmi said, "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."
Lakshmi's mother moved to the United States to escape the stigma of divorce in India. She grew up shuttling between her grandparents in Chennai and her mother in New York. Her native tongue is Tamil, her parents being Tamil Brahmin Iyers.
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