Simone Ashley

Simone Ashwini Pillai, known professionally as Simone Ashley, is a British actress. She is known for her breakout role in the second season of the Netflix period drama "Bridgerton" and for her role in "Sex Education." Other prominent parts include her role as Indira, a sister of Ariel, in the 2023 live-action film adaptation of Disney's The Little Mermaid.

Born to Indian Tamil parents Latha and Gunasekharan Pillai, Ashley is from Camberley, Surrey. Ashley has spoken about how despite growing up in a household of academics, she was always drawn more towards the creative fields. Her parents were hesitant about her inclination to the arts. "My parents were quite protective over me," she told Glamour. "They're first generation. They came from India to this country, so they didn't really have a life where they could choose to be whatever they wanted." Ashley grew up singing classical music and opera and playing piano.

Ashley’s family later moved to Beaconsfield whilst Ashley attended Redroofs Theatre School in Maidenhead for sixth form. She spent some of her teen years in California where she has relatives, and went on to train in acting at Arts Educational School in West London.

Ashley's first acting role was in two episodes of the fantasy teen drama "Wolfblood" as Zuhra. This was followed by appearances in the thriller series "Guilt" and the crime drama "Broadchurch." She made her feature film debut in 2018 with a small role in Boogie Man as Aarti, and a more prominent role in Kill Ben Lyk as one of the many characters named Ben Lyk.

From 2019–2021 Ashley played the recurring role of Olivia Hanan in the Netflix comedy-drama "Sex Education." She also appeared in the ITV psychological thriller miniseries "The Sister" as Elise Fox in 2020. Her work in television has earned her multiple nominations, including Best Actress in a Streaming Series, Drama at the Hollywood Critics Association TV Awards, and a longlist for Best Drama Performance at the National Television Awards. She was also honored as one of Variety's 2021 Brits to Watch. Her performance in "Bridgerton" led to her winning the IMDb Starmeter Award for Breakout Star in 2022.

In 2022, Ashley was featured in the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in European entertainment and was included in the Time 100 NEXT List. She has also been featured in numerous publications including British Vogue, appearing on the cover of their December 2022 issue, The Sunday Times, Cosmopolitan, ELLE, and The Hollywood Reporter.