‘I GAVE UP ACTING AT ONE POINT’

Clocking a decade in showbiz, Mrunal Thakur looks back at the time she felt acting was not working out for her

Among the many challenges showbiz poses, Mrunal Thakur has struggled against losing hope, too. The actor reveals that it was after she gained fame on television and wanted to get into films. “I had confidence in myself, but there was a time when I felt it’s not working out,” Thakur shares.

“Many don’t know that I have been facing the camera for 10 years now. I started acting in 2012. I gave up at one point, after four-and-ahalf years... The fun part is that I gave up, travelled to

Indonesia for six months and lived there,” says the Jersey actor, who started off with TV shows like Mujhse Kuchh Kehti...Yeh Khamoshiyaan and Kumkum Bhagya. Thakur was also seen in the 2016 Indonesian show Tuyul & Mbak Yul Reborn.

“I was thinking of how to wipe off that image of a television actor. It had become a stereotype. Logon ke dimaag mein ban jaata hai, along with a lot of walls — she can’t do this because she did that, she shouldn’t do this because she is doing that. There are all of these permutations and combinations of assumptions that people have. It’s really disheartening sometimes,” elaborates the actor, whose initial plan was to become a journalist. “I was pursuing Bachelor of Mass Media. But my first and only love was the camera,” she tells us.

It was the 2018 film Love Sonia which turned her career around, as the 29year-old admits, “I needed to be seen in a character where it’s not someone wearing kilos of makeup to look pretty. It is one of the biggest challenges for an actor — yes, she is pretty, but can she act? It was amazing to work with an international crew and Demi Moore (actor, in Love Sonia). I felt, that was the moment. It was my ticket to Bollywood,” Thakur concludes.

I was thinking how to wipe off that image of a TV actor. It had become a stereotype. MRUNAL THAKUR, Actor