Padmapriya is the daughter  of a brigadier in the Indian army and the courageous component in her genetic make-up  surfaces at crucial junctures.

She defiantly refused to get pegged down to the tags that typify the heroine of the silver screen -they are forced to fit into the mould of either the glamorously pretty but dumb co-stars who merely simper on the sidelines or else are the high- brow sort  who are too cerebral to merit a second look.

Right from her first film, the Telegu  Seenu Vasanthi Lakshmi she acquired the reputation of being an ‘intellectual beauty’. Reminiscent of the harmoniously symmetrical features of Sharada & Jayaprada, the beauty of this former Miss Andhra Pradesh is evident for the whole world to admire; she gives fresh conformation of her ability with every new role.

Her acting seems to have the elastic quality of plasticine- she gets under the skin of a character as easily as other actresses slip in and out of costumes and discerning directors who harvested the talent have reaped rich dividends- Blessy who cast her in Kaazhcha; Cheran in Thayamai Thavamirundhu; Vasanth in Satham Podathey; Shaji.N.Karun in Kutty Shranku to name a few.

She has proved to be fearless in her selection of characters, choosing not just highly challenging roles that others would think thrice before tackling, but accepting totally de-glamourised characters like the beggar girl Poongodi in Kamal’s Karutha Pakshikal; the street girl Kunnipennu in Adoor’s Naallu Pennungal.

The daredevil spirit lurking beneath the perfect features helped her to essay the role of the fiery guerila warrior Neeli convincingly in Hariharan’s Pazhassi Raja – which won her The Best Character Actress Award  in the Mathrubhoomi Amrita Film Awards [MAFA] 2010 . But sometimes it spills over into real life – as Samy the Tamil Director found to his cost. Samy who was at the helm of  Mirugam is reported to have slapped her during the climax of the film and  Padmapriya was  so incensed, she lodged protests and had him  banned by the Tamil industry.

Padmapriya has a solid background in dancing, being a trained dancer who has more than 200 stage performances under her belt and whose ballet, Krishna Leela  performed for Hyderabad Doordarshan in 1990 is still telecast for all Krishna Jayanthi festivals.

Her ‘flexible’ persona was in full flow during the Super Dancer competition – one moment she was as sober as a Supreme Court Justice, delivering sound judgements on their performances, the next moment she was pulling faces at the official photographer in between posing for him, later she was up on the stage along with the contestants to get a feel of how they felt.

Padmapriya who was attending a reality show for the first time confessed that she couldn’t remember an occasion on which she had enjoyed herself more – to which the contestants would also say “Amen’.