For a select group of actors, the pandemic was not the worst but the best of times, offering breakout triumphs that were the direct result of the rest of the world being shut in with nothing but the telly for company. Charithra Chandran is among them. After making her debut in Amazon’s teen spy series Alex Rider in 2021, she went on to play one of two Indian sisters who took the Regency “ton” by storm in the second season of the Netflix hit Bridgerton. While she is thankful, she is not naive. When I suggest that hers is a whirlwind success, given that she only landed her first job in 2020, she looks horrified and instantly protests: “I don’t think that at all. I think the complete opposite.”
We’re sitting in a London cafe, close to the flat Chandran, who looks much younger than her 27 years, shares with two university friends. “I’ve potentially had the biggest success, in my professional life, in the second thing I’ve ever done,” she says. “I’m not saying I’ll never do anything grander than Bridgerton. I hope that’s not the case – and I have big ambitions. It’s just rather bizarre that it was the beginning of my career. I think it has really warped my sense of achievement.”
