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Ileana D’Cruz revealed she hadn’t planned her Bollywood debut with Barfi. She shared that the Anurag Basu film came to her at a very random time in her career.
Ileana D’cruz opens up about her debut with Barfi.
Ileana D’Cruz made her grand Bollywood debut alongside Priyanka Chopra and Ranbir Kapoor with Barfi, and it has been 13 years since the release of the movie. Now, with the movie crossing the milestone, Ileana opened up and shared that she had actually no plans of making a debut with the Anurag Basu directorial and the project came to her at a “very random time.”
In an interview with NDTV, Ileana D’Cruz shared, “I didn’t really plan my entire career. I didn’t plan on becoming an actor to begin with. So when I did start acting, it was a job. And it was interesting because I hadn’t learnt about acting. It wasn’t a concrete plan — I’ll get to Bollywood after so many years of working in the South.”
“Barfi came at a very random time when I was working in the South. And it was not the story I thought I would get. I thought I’d do this full-blown masala commercial film, but you know Barfi was a commercial film, but it was very niche. It took me a little time to decide whether I should do it,” the actress further added.
It wasn’t an immediate yes for Ileana. The actress, while chatting, revealed that it took a bit of convincing from Anurag Basu which made her finally say yes. “He shot me on a handycam on the pretext of having a candid conversation. At the end of it, all he had to say was, ‘You’re my Shruti.’” Ileana recalled.
About Ileana D’Cruz
The actor was last seen in Do Aur Do Pyaar (2024), a romantic comedy co-starring Vidya Balan, Pratik Gandhi, and Sendhil Ramamurthy.
About Ileana D’Cruz’s personal life
Ileana’s personal life took a happy turn in 2023 when she tied the knot with Michael Dolan in an intimate ceremony. That same year, she welcomed her first child, Koa Phoenix Dolan, in August. More recently, on June 19, 2025, the couple became parents once again with the birth of their second son, Keanu Rafe Dolan.
In the same interview, Ileana spoke candidly about being photographed in India with her children and why she finds it unsettling. “It would definitely have been hard for me to be photographed with my babies. It would just be incredibly confusing for them. And it’s not fair to them because they wouldn’t understand what is going on. I would not be okay with it,” she said.
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September 14, 2025, 14:07 IST
