F L A U N T
LOEWE shirt and skirt (worn as a dress) and BVLGARI necklace, bracelets, and ring.
Put yourself in the shoes of 20-year-old actor, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan. It’s your first day on the set of a Netflix original, your first time getting dressed to play the lead, oh—and it’s your first time ever professionally acting. In the blink of an eye, the stakes have skyrocketed and ‘firsts’ appear to have lost their tenderness. This was, in fact, Ramakrishnan’s induction to the coming of age comedy-drama, Never Have I Ever (NHIE), which has amassed devoted fans and critical acclaim in its soon-to-be third season.
Ramakrishnan plays Devi Vishwakumar—an Indian-American hot-head stumbling through high school, while coping with the loss of her father. Before her on-screen debut, Ramakrishnan grew up in Ontario, Canada, where her high school years were spent on-stage as a theater kid—no, not the ‘belting-Ham-ilton-at-the-top-your-lungs’ theater kid archetype, but more of the ‘acting-is-fun-so-why-not’ type. “I’m an embarrassed theater kid,” she relays. “Maybe that’s it. I don’t know. I couldn’t fully commit to the lifestyle.”
CLAUDIA LI dress, MISTERTRIPLEX top, DIOR boots, BVLGARI earrings, necklace, bracelets, and rings.
Ramakrishnan was chosen as the one of 15,000 candidates to play Devi following an impromptu audition for an open casting call. Members of the NHIE crew anticipated Ramakrishnan cracking under pressure within the first week, but with season three already in the can and premiering this August, she has proven her chops. While the Tamil-Canadian actor hoped the Mindy Kaling-helmed show would earn traction with audiences, its coupling of beautifully awkward romantics with very real, very human hardships are what have elevated the series into its own league.
Ramakrishnan wields her limelight with great responsibility, and acknowledges what NHIE has achieved for South Asian women. “What I love about NHIE,” she considers, “is that within those romantic love triangle scenes, we get to see a brown girl be desired for. Younger me didn’t see those things happen to someone who looked like me. It’s the white girl that gets the romance, it’s the white girl that gets that attention. Now we get to see the brown girl get that. I think younger me would be flipping her shit.”
DIOR shirt and corset and BVLGARI earrings, necklace, bracelets, and ring.
Ramakrishnan’s portrayal of Devi challenges mainstream media. She is one of the first female South Asian leads in a Netflix original series. As Hollywood extends its call to diversify, the rise in representation and defiance of the status quo is a long-awaited feat for minorities who have endured cultural repression in the media—the South Asian community being one of many. Ramakrishnan is a proponent for the green-lighting of more South Asian narratives during this much-needed time of progression. “There’s no better time to be a brown girl than right now,” she asserts. “But, what I will say is that we’re still pretty far. We shouldn’t be a ‘flavor of the month’ kind of thing. I don’t want to be a little trend that fades away. I want to continue and progress to a point where our culture and our stories are just normal.” She continues, “I realized Devi can’t represent all South Asian experiences. But then I realized too, neither can Maitreyi—the person beyond the screen. I can only just be me.”
DIOR shirt, corset, skirt, and shoes and BVLGARI earrings, bracelets, and ring.
Staying true to one’s self can be cumbersome in the public eye. Ramakrishnan cites this as a minuscule hurdle, opting instead to savor life’s mundane moments—grabbing Italian food with friends, watching hours of anime, and playing strictly Nintendo games, for example. Below the surface, Ramakrishnan views her Tamil-Canadian culture as integral to her identity. “Let’s have the conversation about what it means to be of your own cultural identity, what it means to be Desi. To some, being Tamil means knowing the language—being able to write in Tamil and cook the food. Growing up, I couldn’t do that. I lasted a solid day in Tamil school. I would be with other Tamil girls and they would look at me like, ‘You’re not as Tamil as we are,’” she says solemnly. “Ever since, I’ve never questioned my Tamil identity. I’ve never hid away because this is who I am. To me, knowing my culture is knowing my history. That’s where I take my pride.”
Ramakrishnan is the embodiment of a beginner becoming the teacher. The precedent she sets invites open dialogue and welcomes potentially overlooked narratives. Down the line, the NHIE star sees herself directing—but not quite yet, “If I could do this for the rest of my life, I would be so privileged and blessed. I want to direct one day, but I don’t want to go behind the camera quite yet. I still want to get my South Asian face in different roles and in different capacities.” She laughs, “And then I’ll direct and find my brown girl out of 15,000.”
LOEWE skirt (worn as a dress) and BVLGARI necklace, bracelets, and ring.
Photographed by Angella Choe
Styled by Jacquie Trevizo
Hair: Josh Liu
Makeup: Vivian Maxwell
Flaunt film by: Tyler-Marie
Production assistant: Shei Marcelline
Written by: Shei Marcelline
