How Ananya Panday became Gen Z’s most powerful star

The day Ananya Panday walks into our shoot, Mumbai is drowning. It’s the kind of rain that makes Ballard Estate’s cobblestones glisten and turns every commute into a small act of endurance. The crew at our shoot has been fussing under dripping canopies, clutching garment bags like life jackets. By the time the actor arrives at the Mackinnon Mackenzie building, our shoot location, it’s 4 pm. Panday has already sat through an event in the suburbs, smiling through a carousel of interviews, and traffic dragging her across the city. She could have looked tired. She could have looked fed up. She does not.

We are inside an Edwardian neo-classical space that is desperately calling for restoration. Panday walks in a Montsand dress, looking pretty in a way that makes you wonder how she escaped the rain without so much as a frizz. She takes in the room. Her gaze flicks over the racks of clothes lined up for her—sequins, satin, gowns. Can she wear this at an upcoming awards show, she asks her stylist, Priyanka Kapadia. She pauses, tilts her head, as if she’s mentally editing the lineup of looks for today. Only once she’s had her fill of surveying the options does she glide into the vanity van, where the energy shifts entirely.

I am sitting on a sofa in her vanity van, laptop propped awkwardly on my knees. “So, who am I really? You tell her,” she teases Aanchal Morwani, her makeup artist, when I nudge Panday to respond without using the conventional markers of what she does or where she’s from. She dodges the spotlight for just a second before she leans in herself and replies, “I’m fun-loving. I love animals. I’m like a lazy high-functioning person. Either I don’t move for 24 hours or I’m doing 700 things in one day. I love reading. I love my dog. Right now, I’m reading Good Material by Dolly Alderton and rewatching all the Marvel movies.”

Born in 1998, the year Google officially launched, Panday has lived her life on the internet. Perhaps that’s what makes her seem like the most Gen Z star out there. Everything about her—from the way she speaks to the cultural touchpoints she drops into conversation—feels pulled from the same universe as her audience. It offers a snapshot of a generation that is on the verge of adulthood. She overuses the word “bro”. She roots for Conrad in The Summer I Turned Pretty. She’s crazy about podcasts. She orders chilli chicken from Royal China on cheat nights. She can be the chill girl but also the anxious girl.

Like Alia Bhatt from a decade before, Panday made her megawatt debut in glitter and gloss, backed by Dharma Productions, marketed as the next big thing, in Student of the Year 2 in 2019. And like Bhatt, almost instantly, she got the “nepo baby” tag clung to her like static. Then came that infamous roundtable clip and Siddhant Chaturvedi’s razor-sharp one-liner: “Jahan humare sapney poore hote hai, waha se inka struggle shuru hota hai.” It ricocheted through every meme account on Instagram and left her branded as the poster child for privilege. For a while, it seemed like that clip would overshadow everything else.

But five years on, Panday remains grateful for her good fortune while carving out her own space and becoming the sort of star that young girls place on their moodboards. “It’s a fact. My dad [Chunky Panday] is an actor and I’m in the industry,” she says plainly. “It’s not something I’m ashamed of. I’m proud I get to take his legacy forward. My brother Ahaan is doing it now too.”

I didn’t think we would get to Ahaan so fast, but here we are, and I can see how talking about her brother’s debut in Saiyaara makes her visibly soften. “He was the only boy in our cousins’ group, so he was always being forced to play along with us and do our little choreographies,” she laughs. “He’s been making Dubsmashes since he was 12 or 13, so honestly, I always felt like he was meant to be on screen. But nothing prepared me for what I felt when I saw him on the big screen,” she says of his recent stan-dom. “I thought he looked so good, so expressive with his eyes, just a complete star. I don’t usually cry... I’m really not a crier, but when I saw him after the film I just started howling. For me, it felt like something really big was happening, like a huge shift.”

The last time we saw a huge shift was when streaming was just picking up steam. In an industry that rarely anoints new superstars, Panday found her niche. While her contemporaries stayed focused on theatrical releases, she chose OTT to showcase her creative range. On it, a lot of her work rests on Gen Z referencing that feels accurate. The characters she plays, how she dresses the part, and even the jobs she has on screen—the entrepreneur/content creator roles—are stereotypically Gen Z.

Kho Gaye Hum Kahan was the turning point in 2023. Watching her stumble through heartbreak, spiral on social media, or send a regrettable 2 am text felt all too real. It was not some caricature of a Gen Zer; it was us. “I think the reason people connected to Kho Gaye Hum Kahan so much is because they were like, finally a Hindi movie that is showing us the way we actually are,” she says. “I was so happy about that. Because honestly, the way Gen Z has been represented in movies, it’s not been us. It’s been like someone’s idea of us. The maximum messages I got after that film were about relatability, from girls and boys both. And I was like, shit, this is why I want to make movies. I want people to feel seen. I want people to watch something and think, oh my god, I have been Ahana at some point in my life.”

Honestly, the way Gen Z has been represented in movies, it’s not been us. It’s been like someone’s idea of us.”

Ahana, Ananya, and I are so alike, we even have the same sad girl playlist, which is the soundtrack of our shoot today. Halfway through the shoot, she’s balancing a pair of very complicated Jade by Monica & Karishma embellished wings on her back but her only ick is the music: “Okay, I’m done with Pitbull. Can we please play Billie Eilish? Or Lana Del Rey?” she pleads, turning to her little sister, Rysa, for help. The speakers oblige, and she hums through the songs, swaying in between takes like the set is her own personal disco.

I’m not even surprised she’s watching the same thing on TV that is currently blowing up my group chat, and of course, she talks to me like we are old college friends: “You know when you watch The Summer I Turned Pretty and you are like, I have been Belly? That feeling. Because you want to watch things that bring you comfort, that make you feel like you are not alone.”

Panday too imbues her roles with the same authenticity, with performances that explore what it’s like to be young today. And she’s no victim to peer pressure: While her contemporaries are doubling down on romance (Janhvi Kapoor) or thriving in masala entertainers (Sara Ali Khan), Panday has captured the other end of the spectrum by moving through pop culture at her own speed. In some ways, you could say Ananya Panday is Gen Z’s id; her greatest roles do a great job of encapsulating the Gen Z experience. It is probably why people sometimes accuse her of “just playing herself”; her performances seem so convincing, it’s hard to separate the actor from the role.

In Netflix’s CTRL, a satire on social media culture and algorithm-driven living, she’s a social media influencer who learns about data privacy the hard way. In Call Me Bae, her breakout OTT lead, streaming on Prime Video, Panday’s poor little rich girl from South Delhi may, on the surface, appear like she’s a parodied vain girl with a miniature dog à la Elle Woods from Legally Blonde, but watch closely and you’ll see she’s more Alexis Rose from Schitt’s Creek. Because beyond her flawsome wardrobe, the show also manages to mock today’s sensational news cycle and celebrity pop culture.

We needed someone to embody the spirit of a younger Poo (from Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham…) but in 2024. And Ananya just felt like the voice of this generation.”

Collin D’Cunha, the director of Call Me Bae, says that is exactly why he wanted Panday to play Bella Chaudhary. “We needed someone to embody the spirit of a younger Poo (from Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham…) but in 2024. And Ananya just felt like the voice of this generation,” he explains. “She’s also someone who can take a joke on herself, which was very important for Bae.”

Ananya Panday is so Gen Z that between shots she doesn’t ask if her hair is out of place; she takes a selfie to see everything is where it needs to be. “She’s extremely Gen Z in the way that she’s on her phone all the time,” says D’Cunha. “At one point, everyone on set was on BeReal, and she’d be taking photos there because you can’t post on social media during a shoot. It actually became part of our shoot schedule.”

Filmmaker Arjun Varain Singh, who directed her in Kho Gaye Hum Kahan, had probably never heard of doomscrolling until he met her. “She’d be waiting in front of the monitor and scrolling through her phone till she reached the end of her feed. I didn’t even know that was possible!” he laughs.

When it comes to acting, Panday, despite her Gen Z trappings, has a veteran’s ability to handle long hours at a shoot without fuss. At about 7 pm, she sighs, “Right now I just want to go home, work out, and sleep.” She knows it is unlikely, and shoots rarely wrap on time, but the wish is refreshingly ordinary.

I don’t want to do a film just because I have time. My dad’s generation had to do that, because that’s how the system worked then. They had to work two or three shifts a day, sometimes just because they had a personal equation with someone.”

Living in an era of inescapable fan cams, she knows attention is everywhere there is Wi-Fi. And she understands success and stardom differently from her father’s generation of actors. “It has to come from the first feeling. If someone has to convince me to do something, then it’s not right for me. I don’t want to do a film just because I have time. I don’t want to fill a gap. My dad’s generation had to do that, because that’s how the system worked then. They had to work two or three shifts a day, sometimes just because they had a personal equation with someone. But now I feel like I can wait.”

The year 2025 has been relatively quiet since the release of Kesari 2 in April, where Panday never really gets her moment to shine. But even this silence is strategic. Next month, she begins filming Call Me Bae season two, but before that she’s made time for a short getaway to Mykonos and an extended holiday in Miami. You see glimpses of that on her Instagram, where beach photos with friends sit alongside brand campaigns and press stills.

It’s not to say this year is a write-off—she still has Tu Mera, Mein Teri, Mein Tera, Tu Meri with Kartik Aaryan and Chand Mera Dil with Lakshya Sen ready to release. But for her, it is not a career in scramble mode. It is one that is pacing itself deliberately, each step leaving room for both the work and the life that runs alongside it.

Already, on paper, her brand portfolio reads like a luxury hall of fame. Chanel tapped her as its first Indian ambassador, a coup that put her in the same orbit as Margot Robbie and Margaret Qualley. And now it seems like not a week can go by without an announcement of a new brand endorsement on her feed: Lakmé, Skechers, American Tourister, Google Pixel, Whisper, Drools, TOO Yum, and more. She can sell you makeup, shoes, phones, sanitary napkins, dog food and instant noodles with the same conviction, and you will lap it up.

Despite the endorsements, Panday has a way of making sure she’s not just a beautiful face on a billboard. What comes to mind is a scene that is played out on The Tribe, her cousin Alanna Panday’s reality TV show that gives a behind-the-scenes peek into their lives. Panday has just been shown her face on a Diwali firecracker box, and she squeals, “Look, mom! I’m on a phooljhadi packet,” delighted in a way that is both over the top and completely genuine.

Even in the middle of our shoot, with every light and camera trained on her, her authenticity is intact. Unable to give up her big-sister energy, she keeps checking on Rysa, calling out mid-take to make sure she has slapped some Odomos. Rysa, a little embarrassed, mutters, “My mom is paranoid about dengue.”

It’s this way of keeping it real that makes this 26-year-old a good match for the legendary Jackie Shroff. In a now-viral Spotify ad, the two actors play off each other—she mimicking his iconic “bhidu” swagger, and him imitating her squeaky valley-girl drawl. It’s an intergenerational faceoff that is goofy, sharp, and completely self-aware. And it shows that Panday is not afraid to make herself the punchline.

By now, the lights are glaring, the air is heavy with humidity, and the shoot has stretched on till it’s dark outside. Panday, however, is steady. No diva sulking over retakes, no passive-aggressive sighs about delays. She absorbs directions, resets, adjusts. All that she wants, at regular intervals, is her playlist.

At 9 pm, Lana Del Rey is still playing, and Ananya Panday is still humming, twirling lightly between takes like nobody’s watching. (Everyone is watching.) And that is her gift: to be both ordinary and extraordinary in the same breath. “I don’t think of myself as extraordinary,” she shrugs, flashing a smile that could light up a rain-clogged city. “I think of myself as me. And that’s enough.”

Editorial Direction: Megha Mahindru, Ridhima Sapre. Photography: Ashish Shah. Director (Video): Gorkey Patwal. Fashion and Creative Direction: Priyanka Kapadia. Visual and Creative Direction: Jay Modi. Art Direction: Harry Iyer. Bookings Editor: Nikita Moses. Style Lead: Naheed Driver. Multimedia Designer: Mehak Jindal. Makeup: Deepa Verma. Hair: Aanchal Morwani. DOP: Sainil. Styling Assistant: Anish (Photo); Kashish Jain (Style). Production: Imran Khatri Production, Radhika Chemburkar, Hritik Patel. Artist Reputation Management: Hype