Priyanka Chopra Details Botched Surgery That Nearly Ended Her Career

Priyanka Chopra Jonas is sharing how she made it through a “dark” time in her life after a nose surgery gone wrong began to impact her career and her mental health. The Citadel actress, 40, spoke candidly on SiriusXM’s The Howard Stern Show about experiencing depression following the botched removal of a nasal polyp. 

“This thing happens, and my face looks completely different, and I went into a deep, deep depression,” shared Chopra, who shares 1-year-old daughter Malti with husband Nick Jonas. In the aftermath, the actress said she was then fired from three different movies, which had her worried that the surgery’s failure would mean the end of her career altogether. Despite her concerns about going under the knife again, Chopra’s late father, who was a doctor, convinced her to undergo corrective surgery.

“I was terrified of that, but he was like, ‘I will be in the room with you,’” she shared. “He held my hands through it and helped me build back my confidence.” Chopra also named Bollywood director Anil Sharma as someone who helped her regain her confidence. “I was supposed to play this lead, and I was shifted to a supporting character. That filmmaker was very kind,” she recalled. “He, while the tide was against me, said, ‘It will be a small part but give it your all.’ And I did.’”

Also on Stern’s radio show, the Baywatch actress revealed her father once put bars on her windows as her attitude had become “arrogant, vain” and “invincible” when she returned to India at 16 years old following four years in the U.S. “My dad was super paranoid because he sent to America a 12-year-old with braids,” she told Stern. “After all of these American hormones and the food, I come back a little bit more woman than my dad would have anticipated at 16.”

With her “peacocking” at school drawing unwanted attention – including a boy who followed her home and jumped onto her balcony at night, Chopra’s dad decided to put up bars. “He was outside my balcony and I saw him and I screamed and went to my dad. My dad came, he jumped and he went away,” the actress recalled. “The next day my dad was like, ‘You need rules.’” She added, “My dad was like, ‘F- this, bars, all your jeans are confiscated, you are going to wear Indian suits, nothing happening. I had a driver drive me everywhere, he was freaked out.”