So many things can go wrong during your first month of training at the gym. You could easily lift seven-kilogram dumbbells off the rack and almost meet God while lowering them during a chest press. You could get into a one-sided running contest with a guy before realising he’s probably had years of practice and you’re mortifyingly close to the edge of the treadmill. Or, in a moment of misplaced self-confidence, you could sign up for a workout class with Samantha Ruth Prabhu.
When I arrive for our session at Breathe Studio in Khar, I expect I will have some time to get my bearings—by which I mean eliminating any chance of death-by-equipment and coaxing the trainer into going easy on me. But Samantha is already on the mat with head coach Paridhi Doshi, waving me over to join them. I wave back, double-knot my shoelaces and drop a pin to my husband on WhatsApp with the accompanying text saying: “If you don’t hear from me in two hours, look for me in the nearest hospital.”
We start with squats—five-kilogram dumbbells for me, a barbell stacked with plates I’m too afraid to even look at for Samantha. The studio has been asked to turn the music off so I can speak with the actor without having to scream, but between fighting for breath between reps and the clicking sound my knees make every time I move, there’s enough audio disturbance. It’s only when we’re doing wall sits later that I recover enough to really look at Samantha: taut calves, firm stomach, enviable shoulder blades, a face that looks like it is drenched in dew rather than soaked in sweat like mine. “How has the new year started for you?” I blurt out when she catches me staring. “The horoscope writer at Vogue,” I explain, “told me that Taureans will have one of the most transformative years of their lives. Has that been the case for you?”
The 38-year-old star’s answer seems to emerge from post-squat clarity. “The past few years have been incredibly transformative for me. When you’re in the public eye, there’s always a fear of embarrassing yourself, of being cancelled, of being trolled. You’re constantly trying to guard your status because you’re so scared of losing it. Because when you fall, everyone watches, right? It’s public.”
And it has been a very public everything. A very public first wedding to Telugu superstar Naga Chaitanya, followed by a very public divorce and a very public health diagnosis. “When I went through a separation, I closed up completely. I didn’t think it would ever be possible to rely on someone else.” A smile begins to spread across her face, like she’s so glad to have been proven wrong. “Thankfully, I was vulnerable enough to accept that kind of love and friendship. And I’m a much better person because of the relationship I’m in. Because of the person Raj (Nidimoru) is.” It’s a transformation those close to her can attest to. “I met an old friend a few days ago and she sent me a voice note afterwards saying, ‘This is the first time in a long time that I feel like you’re not struggling to breathe.’ I’m not performing anymore.”
Paridhi is shooting daggers at us because we’ve overshot our rest limit and are supposed to be two reps into our next set. Samantha and I, both dyed-in-the-wool millennials, tell her she is too Gen Z to talk or hear about love without feeling embarrassed. She has one word for us both. “Lunges,” she growls. “Leave the 5, pick up the 7.5,” she adds, looking at me stoically and I detect the slightest note of vengeance in her sweet voice. I look to Samantha for help but she, ever the dutiful student, has already started without me.
And so it is that we become like two ships passing in the night—me, an inflatable raft in a hurricane, losing my balance with every step I take; Samantha, a sturdy ocean liner already on her way back to the starting point, ready for her next rep. When our paths cross, she sends words of encouragement my way. “You have great flexibility. I struggled with that.”
When I collapse on the mat two minutes later, she sits next to me quietly, a silence that neither of us feels compelled to break. Instead, her triceps seem to be doing the talking for her, catching the golden hour at different angles as she breathes in and out. She catches me looking—again—and explains, “I do my own stunts in all my films so I have to be strong. It needs to look believable.” I realise, belatedly, that she has mistaken my appreciation for aversion. Her apprehensions aren’t unfounded. When cricketer Smriti Mandhana wore a halter-neck gown to an event in Bengaluru in December last year, her deltoids were deemed ‘too manly’ by men who incidentally looked like they wouldn’t last five seconds in an arm-wrestling match with a kitten. “When I shoot with brands and often in films, too, they try to cover my arms because they think muscles on a woman aren’t attractive,” Samantha confesses. “Which is why,” she continues, beaming now, “it was so cool that Vogue gave me weights during the shoot and asked me to pump before each shot so my triceps would look well-defined. That’s usually only done for men.”
Her upcoming Telugu film Maa Inti Bangaaram makes full use of all the hours she’s been putting in at the gym. In the trailer, Samantha plays the docile daughter-in-law with a secret: she can beat up any man who asks for it. She kicks one off a moving bus, stabs another in the eye with furniture and drags another through a home courtyard—all while wearing a sari. “I haven’t fought in a sari before, so that was definitely challenging,” the actor laughs. “Also, because I’ve produced this film myself under Tralala Moving Pictures, the budget had to be kept super tight. We finished shooting the bus fight scene in five hours, where it usually takes around two days. It was quite stressful.” Producing and acting in Maa Inti Bangaaram aren’t the only things on her plate either: less than two months after launching her fashion label Truly Sma, she launched her activewear brand Mile Collective; her clean-perfume brand Secret Alchemist raised $3 million in a seed-funding round by Unilever Ventures; and, as the co-owner of Chennai Super Champs, she is racquet-deep in prep ahead of season two of the World Pickleball League. Still, it’s clear where her heart’s compass points. “I’ve not had a film release in over two and a half years because of the break I took for my health. Yes, I’ve invested in many businesses and enjoy the entrepreneurial side of things, but acting is my first love so it feels great to be in front of the camera again.” And does a certain Raj Nidimoru’s presence on set as the creator of Maa Inti Bangaaram have anything to do with it? “Raj and I really are that irritating couple that does everything together,” Samantha laughs. “We work together, we play together, we work out together with Paridhi. And we love it. If I have to travel for even a day, I’m like… [pretends to swoon in distress.] I don’t think it’s a honeymoon phase. Too much time has passed for it to be that.”
It helps that the newlyweds’ professional relationship precedes their love story: In 2021, Nidimoru directed Samantha in season two of The Family Man, a debut OTT outing that earned her critical acclaim in the hard-to-crack digital landscape. They reunited for Citadel: Honey Bunny in 2024, but could not recreate the magic they had previously conjured on screen. If the early chatter around Maa Inti Bangaaram is anything to go by, third time’s the charm, but I’m sure it doesn’t come with out the challenges of working with someone you share a home with. “In fact, it’s the opposite for me,” Samantha shrugs, blushing. “As an actor, you want to get into the skin of the character on your own terms without worrying about whether the director will think you’re stupid or incapable. With Raj, it’s too late now. Even if I embarrass myself, he can’t leave me.” So much so that she feels that her husband’s presence on set has helped her unlock a new level of acting. “Leonardo DiCaprio keeps on working with Martin Scorsese and his performances just keep getting more layered. I think I’m becoming a better actor because Raj is around.”
“Okay, last exercise and then I’ll let you two continue yapping,” Paridhi promises, leading Samantha away to do box jumps. “Give me 15,” she tells her and turns to me slowly, as if wondering whether she should test me or spare me. “Fifteen step-ups,” she decides, showing me to an aerobic-style bench that looks so much safer than the black box of death Samantha is steadily jumping on and off. Unlike me, the actor doesn’t complain. You can tell she’s grateful to be rebuilding her body—both physically and mentally—four years into living with myositis, an autoimmune disease that causes muscle inflammation and makes movement painful. She has an elaborate morning routine (“I wake up, pray, get some sunlight and meditate so it’s a good one and a half hour to myself before I meet Raj”). She isn’t tempted by cheat meals (“I ate the same vegetables and basic chicken dishes every single day for a year because anything could trigger my condition, so there’s no temptation anymore”). And above all, she is in a committed relationship with her gratitude journal. We’re now sitting in the café attached to Breathe Studio, and the actor shows me a few entries she’s logged into the diary app on her phone. “When I fell sick, a doctor advised me to start writing out my feelings. For the first six months, every day, I would wake up and write, ‘I’m in pain. I’m tired.’ It was all negative thoughts. You can tell I’m struggling to write.” I look at a couple of stilted affirmations from December 2023: ‘All is good.’ ‘All is well.’ ‘This is my time.’ But then, she tells me, without any grand epiphany, something changed. “I decided that no matter what happened, I would only write positive things going forward. Even on days I felt miserable, I would write, ‘Today is going to be amazing.’ ” After a few months, she realised she wasn’t pretending anymore. “I wasn’t magically healed or physically better, but I was starting to feel a lot more positive about my condition improving. That’s when I understood that what you project, manifest and speak out will come to pass.”
Today, 16 years since her debut, little fazes Samantha, especially on the outside. She’s aware that the winds of support blowing her way on the internet could change course the next day. “I don’t take the compliments or criticism seriously. Not the times they tell me I’m an angel, nor the times they tell me I’m the worst person on the planet. Sixteen years is a long time; you develop a thick skin.” Except it has been more than 16 years, hasn’t it? Ye Maaya Chesave may have been her first movie to hit theatres in 2010 but the first film she shot for in 2007 was Moscowin Kavery opposite actor-director Rahul Ravindran, who is one of her closest friends today. “Oh my god, yes, we were such babies. We would go to the set, iron our own clothes to wear for the scene and give our shot. He was the best thing to come out of that film.”
Throughout our conversation, Samantha’s phone has buzzed with calls and messages, every one of which she has courteously ignored. I imagine it’s a busy period for her as a multihyphenate who has several active entrepreneurial hustles and a film on the cusp of release. But then her screen flashes with a call from her husband and she won’t let it go to voicemail. “Babu, I’ll be home in 15 20 minutes,” she coos, and I realise our time is up. “It’s only January and so much has happened already. It’s going to be a very important year,” the actor effuses. “Hopefully, I’ll come out of it happy, not with everything around me burnt to the ground. Let’s reconnect at the end of the year to take stock.”
Photographed by Bikramjit Bose
Styled by Devanshi Tuli
Hair: Daksh Nidhi/The Artists Project
Makeup: Avni Rambhia
Bookings editor: Aliza Fatma
Entertainment director: Megha Mehta
Senior entertainment editor (consultant): Rebecca Gonsalves
Production: Imran Khatri Productions
Assisted by: Tushar Tara (photo); Shriya Saxena (hair); Bidipto Das, Harshita Samdariya (styling); Jasleen Narang (bookings); Radhika Chemburkar (production)
Location courtesy: The Great Eastern Home
This story appears in Vogue India’s January-February 2026 issue. Subscribe here.
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