Priya Prakash Varrier says she faced cyber bullying for her famous wink scene in Oru Adaar Love

Priya Prakash Varrier says she dealt with cyber harassment and bullying after her first film, Oru Adaar Love. The actor says her ‘wink’ in the Malayalam high school drama became a big deal, which was ‘totally out of her control’.

Priya Prakash Varrier will soon be making her acting debut in Hindi films with Love Hackers, which is reportedly based on a true story. In the upcoming crime thriller the actor plays a teenager, who survives a cybercrime. In a new interview, Priya opened up about facing cyber harassment and bullying in real life after her first film Oru Adaar Love.

Priya Prakash Varrier became known for her song Manikya Malaraya Poovi from the 2019 film Oru Adaar Love.

Her song Manikya Malaraya Poovi from the 2019 Malayalam film featured a wink and flying kiss that made Priya a known face overnight. Following this, a case was filed against the film’s director and Priya for hurting religious sentiments. Now, before her Bollywood debut, Priya recalled how she came to be known as ‘wink girl’ after her film Oru Adaar Love. She said she was only 18 at the time, and did not know ‘how to deal’ with the ‘noise around her wink’.

In a recent interview with News 18, Priya shared how she faced ‘trolls, memes and hate comments’ after her first film. “When I started out, a big blow up happened. The noise around my wink was something that was totally out of my control or power. I didn’t even get enough time to process what was happening. By then, trolls, memes and hate comments had already started. Initially, it was a little hard to adjust to whatever was happening because as an 18-year-old outsider, I had no one guiding me or telling me the things that I should do or not do and how to deal with such a situation. When you face so many things so early on in your career, they tend to take a toll on you and there’s a lot of self-doubt that comes with it,” Priya said.

The actor added it was ‘tough’ for her initially, but with time she learnt how to deal with ‘trolls and hate comments’. Priya, 22, said people treat celebs as ‘public properties as opposed to public figures’, but it was not acceptable to say whatever they wanted to say about celebs. She said people ‘can’t cancel’ stars.

“It’s definitely been tough for me initially but over time, I got used to trolls and hate comments and learnt to ignore unnecessary things. These things are a part and parcel of our profession and all actors go through bullying and trolling on a daily basis… People forget that we’re as human as they are. They perceive us as public properties as opposed to public figures. As actors, all of us put ourselves a little bit more out there than the rest of the population. But you just can’t say whatever you want to about us; you can’t hate us or cancel us,” Priya said.

Priya works predominantly in Telugu and Malayalam films. After she rose to fame with Oru Adaar Love, she had become the most searched-for personality on Google in India in 2018. Since then she has worked in Telugu films like Check, which released in 2021, and Ishq: Not a Love Story.