Nargis Fakhri

Fakhri was born on October 20, 1979, in Queens, New York City, to Mohammed Fakhri, and Marie Fakhri, a former police officer. Her father is Pakistani, and her mother is Czech. She has one younger sister, Aliya. Fakhri's parents divorced when she was six, and her father died a few years later. Because of her mixed Pakistani-Czech ethnicity and American nationality, Fakhri describes herself a "global citizen". Fakhri grew up in Mohegan Lake, New York, in Yorktown. Fakhri started her career as a model at the age of 16. In her later years, she appeared as a contestant on the second and third cycle of America's Next Top Model (2004). Although Fakhri was selected for the first two challenges of both the cycles, she failed to make up to the third challenge for the top twelve contestants. She subsequently modeled professionally in America, working for freelance agencies, and appearing regularly at fashion shows. Fakhri's fame increased when she appeared in a popular Indian print campaign for the 2009 Kingfisher Calendar. Her appearance in the Kingfisher Calendar attracted the attention of Indian filmmaker Imtiaz Ali. He selected her for a role in the Hindi romantic drama Rockstar. Fakhri later said that she agreed to work in India so that she could "relate to [her] culture" and get "close to [her] roots [Pakistan]", because India and Pakistan share similar cultures.