She’s back in the spotlight with the July 2025 release of The Good Wife, a Tamil courtroom drama streaming on JioHotstar, where she plays Tarunika, a homemaker-turned-lawyer navigating betrayal, public scrutiny, and personal redemption. Directed by the legendary actress Revathy, the series is a bold reimagining of the American classic, and Priyamani’s performance is already being hailed as one of her most layered yet.

But she’s not stopping there. Soon, the dimpled darling of the silver screen will be seen sharing screen space with none other than Vijay Sethupathi in an upcoming pan-Indian film directed by Puri Jagannadh, a gritty, emotionally charged project that promises to be a cinematic rollercoaster.

From Paruthiveeran to The Family Man, and now The Good Wife and beyond, Priyamani continues to redefine what it means to be a leading lady in Indian cinema. Today, we sit down with the powerhouse performer to talk about reinvention, resilience, and the roles that have shaped her journey.

So what drew you to the role of the main character in The Good Wife and its Indian adaptation?
I haven’t watched the English version of The Good Wife. I knew what the story was all about, so what drew me to it was how they have adapted it to the Tamil culture and how they’ve changed it to everything what a scenario would be in Chennai. With the situations that I bought in with the cases that have been shown in this series are all very relevant today. And I think also the scenes between the husband and wife, the scenes of the law firm, all that is very real and everybody would connect with these scenes.

So you built your character from scratch right? There was no homework done for preparing for this role?
Nothing. Not at all. There was no homework at all. I’m an extremely spontaneous actor. So, once I come on the set and I see what can be done, I do accordingly.

What was the brief given to you and how did you go about executing it?
I was told how it will be shot at a juvenile court, which is very relevant to the story. Not many people know how it is today, because it’s very easy to just probably say, okay, this is a juvenile court. Generally, they show it like a regular court with judges wearing their uniform, with the lawyers in their lawyer uniforms, and you have the accused, you have the victim, and you have the families, cops and everybody else around. But actually, in the juvenile court, there’s absolutely nobody. You have the judge, you have one or two people, an advocate, an opposing counsel, and then you have the victim and just their family. That’s it. So, if you count, there are only about maximum 10 people as opposed to a court which has more than that. And nobody is dressed formally. They’re dressed very casually to make sure that the juvenile feels comfortable and only if he or the accused or the victim feel comfortable to talk about it, only then the court will have the session. I got to know all this only while we were shooting for The Good Wife. And it’s very relevant today because that’s the amount of research that has gone behind all this. Also, how do you behave in court, like how do you address a judge? It’s very easy to say ‘Your Honour’, but sometimes you actually address the judge as ‘Your Lordship’. Not many people know that. We showed the real picture.

So how does your character follow the original character in the original series, and how has she adapted to the Indian scenario?
It doesn’t follow the original one at all. It’s completely different. Yes, in terms of the news, the scandal and she working at the law firm, all that aspect could be the same like how it is in the original series, but everything else is completely different and designed for the local audience. Also, her dynamics with her husband, because what all a woman goes through even afterwards and how it has completely taken her off course, because of that incident, how she pulls up her socks and how she regains herself. When it comes to the family as well, especially the kids are the ones that are the most affected and how she deals with it, because they’re the most traumatised. She tries to give them attention to get out of that trauma and the steps she takes to see that they are okay. Also, whoever is around her, who’s affected, could be the mother-in-law, or her friends, or even herself and how she deviates all this and manages all the work pressure alongside. She also has to prove that she’s competent at work also as she’s again fighting for that spot with another guy at her law firm. The story revolves around how she goes about to prove herself.

Is there any particular scene from the courtroom that challenged you emotionally, something that you felt was too intense for you?
No, not at all. I don’t take anything back home with me. I leave everything on the set. The moment the director says pack up or cut it’s done and dusted. I don’t let my work affect me mentally.

How was the camaraderie between you, Sampath Raj and Aari Arujunan on the sets?
Should I be honest about how we used to fight every morning? I’m joking. He’s a sweetheart. I’ve known Sampath the longest. Although we’ve worked together in two or three films like Paruthiveeran and Thotta, we’ve never had a scene opposite each other in any of those three films. Yet, I think right through Paruthiveeran because we have a Bangalore connect as well, I think we just hit it off. And I think that’s what you see on screen. And with Aari, we were supposed to actually work on another web series, but that didn’t work out for some rhyme or reason. But then once we got to work here on The Good Wife, I think there’s obviously been a good comfort level with all of us. And I was extremely happy working with them on the sets.

Any memorable experience you would like to recall behind the scenes shoots for this?
We would talk in the mornings, about what we’d have for lunch every day. There were no rehearsals as such but we would just talk about what we were shooting that day. And then suddenly we would just switch over and talk about some other topic. It was a lot of fun and a lot of good work.

So was Revathy very strict on the sets?
She’s like one of those teachers you love to be in class with.
You’ll always have a favourite teacher in school, who would scold
if you did anything, but you’d still want to attend
her class. She’s like that. She’s a no-nonsense person but
doesn’t mean that she’s strict. She is no-nonsense. And
you as a person should know, okay, what can make her
happy? So, you basically keep your boundaries and things
are fine.

You guys have done films…
I’m a very spontaneous actor. I don’t generally go into doing a lot of homework until and unless I’ve been told to or if it is required. I just go with the flow. I read the lines. I see what I can do. I’m very fortunate that I’ve been working with a lot of directors, who are extremely open to suggestions. You go and say, Revathy ma’am, can I do this? Do you think Tarunika is a character who would actually say something like this? Is there room for her to say something like that, and should react this way? So she says, yeah, you’re right, or she’d probably think it herself being an actor herself. She would say, yeah, maybe, okay, let’s see, you do it, let me see. Then once she sees the rehearsal, if she feels that, I’m right, then she lets me do it. We did improvise on the scenes.

What is your current guilty pleasure on OTT platform? Anything you’re watching?
It’s actually been more than two months that I’ve seen anything, because I’ve been thrown into different time zones in the last two months that I’m still trying to adjust to which time zone I belong to right now.

How would you best describe the whole series in a line or two?
Binge watch!

Rapid Fire

Tea or coffee?
Coffee.

Beach or mountains?
Mountains.

Books or movies?
Movies.

Early morning or late nights?
Early morning.

Dogs or cats?
Both.

Gym or Yoga?
Both.

Genre, you’d love to explore?
Comedy.

An actor you’d like to share the screen with?
Amitabh Bachhan and Kamal Haasan.

If not acting, would you be a lawyer?
I would have been either an air hostess or into total management.

You have any lawyers in your family?
I have a criminal lawyer and a corporate lawyer in my family.

What next?
Family Man 3 is going to come out. Then I have a Tamil film with Vijay Sethupathi that we have started shooting. Infact we are almost finishing it. Just a couple more days of shoot left and then discussions are happening on a few more scripts. Will soon be signing on a couple of more films.