Lakshmi Manchu is the daughter of actor-producer Mohan Babu.
The actress noted that she had to “fight for” everything her brothers got “easily”.
Actress Lakshmi Manchu recently opened up about shifting to Mumbai and her struggles in the Telugu film industry, despite being the daughter of actor-producer Mohan Babu. In a recent interview, she called her family a “roadblock” when she moved to North India. Speaking to a publication, Lakshmi claimed that her family did not let her move to Mumbai “for the longest time” because they are very close. She said, “They had their own reservations. I used to stay at my best friend Rakul Preet Singh’s house. She always insisted that I move to Mumbai. I chatted with Rana (Daggubati), and he told me that I cannot stay in Hyderabad forever.” Lakshmi also noted that her daughter’s (Nirvana) young age was also one of the reasons why she could not move.
Lakshmi noted that she had to “fight” for everything her brothers got “easily”. “I am a victim of patriarchy,” she said, adding, “Men in the South don’t understand that heroes’ sisters or daughters are actresses. They shy away from casting people like us. Prakash (Kovelamudi) introduced me to the films (Anaganaga O Dheerudu), but my father and his father (Raghavendra Rao) tried to put the idea out of our heads.”
Lakshmi is one of the few actresses in the industry who come from a film family.
Lakshmi worked in the US for a while and acted in TV series like Las Vegas, Boston Legal and Desperate Housewives, besides films like The Ode and Dead Air. She returned to India and made her debut in Tollywood in 2011, where she went on to act in films like Gundello Godari and W/O Ram. She recently made her debut in Malayalam cinema with the 2022 Mohanlal-starrer Monster. This year, she played the lead role in the Disney+ Hotstar series Yakshini.