Nargis Fakhri is an American model and actress who mainly appears in Bollywood movies. Fakhri began her career as a model and appeared as a contestant in The CW series America's Next Top Model. She made her acting debut in the 2011 romantic drama Rockstar, for which she received a Filmfare Award for Best Female Debut nomination. She received praise for starring as a war correspondent in the political thriller Madras Cafe (2013). She later appeared in the successful comedies Main Tera Hero (2014), Spy (2015) and Housefull 3 (2016), the second of which was a Hollywood production.
Fakhri was born in Queens, New York, to Mohammed Fakhri, a businessman, and Marie Fakhri, a former officer. According to the actress, her father was from Pakistan, and moved to the United States for better earning, while her mother is Czech. She has a sister Aliya.Fakhri's parents divorced when she was six, and her father passed away a few years later.Because of her mixed Pakistani and Czech ethnicity, she describes herself a "global citizen".
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 The CW reality series 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 highly 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 the same culture.