I’m starting with a disclaimer. It is impossible to map all the things that Padmavati Rao has done and continues to do. She has worked as an actor, writer, playwright, translator, puppeteer, story-teller, assistant director, dubbing director, dialogue writer, poet, artist, eco-activist, school teacher, theatre facilitator, farmer and even made a refrigerator (yes, you read that right) that can run without electricity.
Padmavati’s work has — literally and metaphorically, spanned different locations in time, space and intent. Yet, speaking to her, you feel the gentleness of her strength, see a stubborn love for life (despite the pain that life can bring) and sense her childlike glee about her next creative foray. When Padmavati Rao made her big screen debut in Girish Karnad’s Kannada film Ondanondu Kaladalli , she was a 15-year-old school girl called Akshatha Rao from erstwhile Bombay.
At 17, she became a popular actor after essaying the role of Geetha in a Kannada film of the same name. Exasperated by the fame the film brought her, she cut her hair to encash the small joys of walking on MG Road in Bangalore, “without being interrupted by fans.” To date, she is referred to as “Geetha film heroine.
” It makes her happy that “Geetha — the feisty girl in love with life, is remembered for what she was.” Padmavati with Naseeruddin Shah in The Miniaturist of Junagadh | Photo Credit:Courtesy: Prime Video Even before that unexpected call from cinema and adulation, .