‘I never put myself in any image’

speaks to about working in ‘Mentalhood’, her experience of acting in a web-series, and how she is keeping herself busy in self-quarantine.

Actor

Q. How is working from home turning out for you? A.I think for artists the focus has shifted to “self-creation”; there is no serious deadlines now, our work never stops. As for me, right now I am on a retreat. I don’t have television at home for the past 10 years, so I am spending my time reading, studying. I am kind of used to this “staying at home” thing.

Q. Tell us about Mentalhood?

A. I am grateful for this series; it’s such a paradox that it has come out when people have been asked to stay at home. In such a time of crisis, people are watching and appreciating it, especially mothers. I have been getting a lot of messages and people are saying that it’s great that they have a show with which everyone can relate to. My character, Namrata, is a 21st-century woman who is ambitious and believes in this materialistic world. She thinks that anything can be controlled by money and technology, which is not the truth that she later discovers.

Q. Were you comfortable taking up a series where you weren’t the lead, but had to share the screen space with the likes of Sandhya Mridul and Karishma Kapoor, among others?

A. I really feel that once you work in an ensemble, the entire ensemble feels like a single organism. It feels wonderful to work on a project together with so many talented people and it is always a lesson to better yourself. Our director is a wonderful visionary who knows how to put people in part of a montage, and use their individual talent for a collective benefit. I had numerous fan moments on the set, but the minute one is in character, everything else disappears. It is after you hear “cut!”, you realise that it is Sandhya Mridul, or Dino Morea or Sanjay Suri.

Q. Will we be seeing more of you?

A. Yes, I was on a sabbatical earlier, but the audience will be seeing more of me now.

Q. Do you feel that you have been typecast after BA Pass? How comfortable are you with grey shades of your characters?

A. I had struggled with that image earlier, but now I am comfortable with it. I believe that an artist should be like water, they have to adapt to any character they are put in. Also, I love grey shades, because they give me the space to explore the character and myself.