Poorna Jagannathan Feels Luckier Than Ever

Poorna Jagannathan is known for making TV fans laugh and cry in equal measure. As Nalini on Mindy Kaling’s Netflix hit Never Have I Ever, the 52-year-old actress played a strict and caring dermatologist balancing motherhood, her career, and grieving her late husband. Since the series ended in 2023, Jagannathan has been flexing her action muscles with roles in feature films, the upcoming DC series Lanterns, and now Hulu’s Deli Boys. The star plays someone who could be seen as the opposite of her breakout role on Never Have I Ever: Lucky, the second-in-command to a Philadelphia drug kingpin who “[doesn’t] have a maternal bone in her body.” But Jagannathan knows how similar the pair really are.

“Both Lucky and Nalini are very strong women,” Jagannathan tells Marie Claire ahead of Deli Boys’ March 6 release. “Nalini is mentally strong, and she has will and determination. Lucky will take 10 guys out before her first cup of coffee in the morning.” Though the two characters inhabit very different worlds, they show two sides of the effortless badassery the actress has to tap into in her work and everyday life. Or, as the mother of one describes, “When you have teenagers, you automatically just become a gangster. It is just who you have to be.”

As Lucky, Jagannathan is a terrifying force in sleek coats and leather pants, running a major corporation’s legal and illicit affairs. When her business partner Baba (Iqbal Theba) unexpectedly dies, she’s left to look after his clueless sons, straight-laced Mir (Asif Ali) and spiritual Raj (Saagar Shaikh). Throughout the season, Lucky lets down more and more of her guard to the sons, as the actress once again masters a role that has her juggling grief with the high-stress pressures of day-to-day survival. But those emotional moments are rare. Lucky’s often too busy cursing in Hindi while cleaning up the brothers’ latest mess—and looking fabulous as she does it.

While Jagannathan is eternally proud of her previous standout roles, which she describes as having a “deep political message behind them,” she knows sometimes viewers need levity. “The Night Of tackled Islamophobia in ways that were so novel; Ramy was such an insight into a woman's desire. For Never Have I Ever, I'm an immigrant mom, and it was my deepest desire to portray us in a three-dimensional way and to see myself on television as a mother,” she says. “Deli Boys is just out here for laughs, and that's what I love about it.”

With Deli Boys streaming now on Hulu, Jagannathan chats with Marie Claire about how Lucky’s mob-boss style has seeped into her wardrobe, performing stuntwork alongside Tan France, and why she hopes to play roles beyond her imagination.

Marie Claire: Many people know you best from Never Have I Ever. What was your first reaction when you got this opportunity to play such a different character?

Poorna Jagannathan: I could never have dreamed of a role like this being written for a South Asian woman, let alone being offered to me. This is not part of my imagination, you know? It is not in my wildest dreams.

[Lucky] is physically strong, and it's an aspect of her that she doesn't want to show to the boys. As Baba didn't want to reveal who he was, Lucky also doesn't want to show the boys who she is and what she's capable of until she has to.

MC: What was your experience learning the fight choreography and stunts for Deli Boys?

PJ: I've done stunts not a lot, but enough times to know you need to get it right just once. So, after you do it a thousand times, the odds are in your favor. There's a [scene] where I'm throwing the knife [at Tan France’s Zubair], which we had to do like a million times. There's one where I throw the knife up in the air and I catch it. That happened on the first try miraculously, beginner's luck. But there is one where I step on his foot, and the gun has to pop up and I have to catch it. Our stunt choreographer, Chris Nolte, would be laughing while he's choreographing in his head, because he goes like, How can I make this violent and hilarious? I also have no upper body strength. I may look physically badass, but tell me to open a jar of tomato sauce and it's just not going to happen.

MC: How did fashion play a role in developing your performance as Lucky?

PJ: So much. Cailey Breneman was the costume designer. On her vision board for the character, she had '70s Bollywood stars like Zeenat Aman and Parveen Babi. The hair was big and they had this bohemian look, so she wanted to get that bigness from the Bollywood stars. Then she also had these '90s supermodels, like Cindy Crawford and Linda Evangelista, and it was all shoulders and Mugler jackets. Lucky's carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders, and therefore they have to be very, very padded. We went a little mob wife-y, but she is the mob. Women want pockets, but Lucky needed a holster in whatever outfit. That's how we approached her.

Lucky's style never used to be my style, and now it's all I do. I'm always now in faux fur coats. I now wear sunglasses. I only wear stuff with shoulders. It has totally transformed my personal style. I have found my sense of dress through Lucky, which is very '90s, but also much more masculine. I never shied away from it, but I am now fully in my Lucky fashion era.

MC: Lucky is very protective of the boys, even though she'll also rightfully admit that they are idiots. How would you describe her relationship with them, before and after Baba's death?

PJ: She's foisted into this role of taking care of these two idiots, and she loves them. They're the closest thing to family that she has, but I don't think she has any intention of really taking care of them. Ideal scenario: They would be out of the picture, or stay ignorant, and she could run the business. But her hand is forced at some point during the pilot when they're like, No, I want to know what's going on. Her objective is always to shield them from the truth like Baba did. At some point, she has to not only reveal to them what the business is but teach them the ropes. She needs them to learn really fast. But unfortunately, they just couldn't be stupider, so it's a challenge.

Lucky knows that, out of all the worlds that women have to be in, this is the most male-dominated world that she can possibly be in. She knows that she's at a disadvantage being a woman and taking over the business because that is so [not done], especially in this particular world of Pakistani men. So she really has no other choice than to put these two idiots as front-facing CEOs of this particular company. She has to protect them and make sure that they don't get killed, but more importantly, she has to make sure that they don't get us killed.

That's the tightrope walk she's constantly doing. But as the series goes on, the boys have ideas that end up saving the business, and she understands that they may not be as stupid as she initially thought and perhaps are capable.

MC: Lucky faces a double-edged sword in both organized crime being male-dominated, and in the culture, especially with [her colleague] Ahmed being just so misogynistic.

PJ: I really feel like Lucky is based on [Deli Boys creator] Abdullah [Saeed]'s mom, called Seema. She was a single mom who raised two kids. Then Michelle Nader, our showrunner, [is] always walking into male-dominated rooms and gets underestimated all the time. Jenni Konner, Nora Silver, who are our producers, same thing. They are powerful female producers who have to walk into rooms [that] are completely male-dominated in this industry. So, yes, Lucky is a gangster, she's in a context—but that context is applicable to many other rooms.

MC: Throughout the show, there is a mystery of not knowing whether Lucky will betray the boys. How was it to walk that additional tightrope of ruthless yet loyal?

PJ: I think episode six is one of the most seminal because you see the boys' grief and you see Lucky's grief. She lost not only her business partner. She lost a person who saved her. There's a loyalty she has to Baba and therefore the boys. She made a promise to protect them, and Lucky's ruthless, but she will keep her word. She's like the first one who will tackle trolley problems in a way that they should be tackled, in a way that is all about efficiency and being crystal clear and what the business needs for its greater good. But when it comes to the boys, I think they're really her soft spot, because they're the only family she knows.

Seeing that nurturing aspect of Lucky also brings out the comedy. There's that scene at the end of episode six where she's like, 'You boys did good. I'm proud of you.' I say that, and then I turn around. I put my hand out and I slap both of them with one hand. That's how I grew up. My parents and my teachers were all about efficiency. Like, if you could just line us all up and slap us all in one line, that's how we were raised. The two moments are there to heighten the comedy. If you lean into the sweet, then the other moment will pop—or it will be unexpected. The beauty of Deli Boys is a lot of unexpected comedy.

MC: You've made a career of fighting against stereotypical depictions of South Asian women and bringing more humanity, messiness, and nuances onto the screen. What are your goals for representing this community with your roles going forward?

PJ: My imagination is limited—just because I grew up without any representation. I watched E.T. when I was 9 and I was so absolutely in love with it. I wanted so much to be part of whatever world was going on, but I could never dream of being an actor. So I went and studied astrophysics even though I consistently failed math my entire life. I was kicked out of my astrophysics program in about three months. It was this deep, deep desire to be in this world, but when you don't even see yourself, it limits your imagination in the most intense way. So when people ask me that, I am always dumbstruck.

Never Have I Ever is the closest to what I dreamt of because it is so close to me. I am an immigrant. I'm a mother of a teenager. My son went to college at exactly the same time. It was parallel tracks, and it was close to me. My roles in Lanterns and Deli Boys are literally something I don't have the imagination for. I hope those are only the roles I get—stuff that I myself don't have the imagination for. I hope that people see me in things that I cannot imagine for myself.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.