Radhika Apte on food, female pleasure and self-acceptance

She’s bold, she’s beautiful and she’s honest. These are only a handful from a host of things we absolutely love about actress Radhika Apte. She has given stellar performances in films such as Andhadhun, Parched and Lust Stories and being vocal about breaking gender stereotypes in the film industry both on screen and off. And at the heart of it, she continues to navigate her way towards becoming a more confident and self-loving version of herself. She got candid with us in conversation and here’s what she had to say.

Cosmopolitan India: What is the contribution of OTT in shattering gender stereotypes? 

Radhika Apte (RA): I don’t think it’s just because of OTT, I think it’s just the times are changing and OTT happened, the pandemic happened, lots of things happened, so It’s just not one thing leading to the other.

Cosmopolitan India: Your film Parched spoke about female pleasure, what is something you want the world to know about female pleasure?

RA: That they all should know about female pleasure. 

Cosmopolitan India: What would you tell your 18-year-old self?

RA: That your moustache is going to go away. It’s just going to go away one day, which it did. 

Cosmopolitan India: Where do you draw your conference from?

RA: Just learning and accepting yourself slowly. I wasn’t born confident, definitely not, I still struggle with confidence sometimes. But everyone is as insecure as you are and everyone’s going through the same thing. 

Cosmopolitan India: What are you watching right now? 

RA: I need to watch, Patal Lok and Tabbar and the other two things I’ve been told to watch are Dahmer and The Watcher. 

Cosmopolitan: What is your comfort food? 

RA: Toast and butter, ice cream, cake, khichdi, everything my mum makes, Baker’s Basket cake, Thai food, pasta. I love food.

Cosmopolitan India: What is self-love to you?

RA: To be able to eat all this food. No, I’m just joking. I think self-love is accepting the changes your body goes through, your mind goes through. Your opinions change, and you feel differently towards things. So just acceptance and letting yourself change, letting yourself experiment, explore different things and not denying yourself things all the time and never shaming yourself.