At the fourth Red Sea International Film Festival, in December 2024, Priyanka Chopra Jonas received an honorary award from Sarah Jessica Parker. In her speech, she paid tribute to films that cross borders, and to her late father.
A career across borders
Presenting the award, Sarah Jessica Parker recalled Chopra Jonas’s Indian films, from Fashion to Barfi! and Bajirao Mastani, then her conquest of Hollywood with Quantico, Citadel and The White Tiger. She also saluted her work as a producer who amplifies new voices, as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and as an advocate for women.
“Films with subtitles don’t travel”
Chopra Jonas began working at 18, in an industry that made films in Hindi and Telugu. When she looked for work abroad, she was told that non-English films and films with subtitles “don’t travel”. “Yet here we are,” she said, to applause. She thanked the festival for creating a space where filmmakers meet without thinking about nationality or language, especially in her part of the world.
As a producer, she said, she seeks out new filmmakers because she loves new voices. She dedicated part of her speech to her father, whom she lost in 2013: “the first entertainer I ever knew”, always at the centre of the party, who showed her how joyful, confident and vulnerable entertainment can be.