Mumbai, Jan 23 (PTI) Actor Bhumi Pednekar says after working continuously for a decade, she saw a slight corruption creeping into her performances, prompting her to go on a sabbatical of ten months.
The
36-year-old actor is now back, feeling fresh and promoting her new show "Daldal", a crime thriller which is polar opposite to her OTT debut series "The Royals" in 2025.
"I made the best decision of my life... I felt like if I needed longevity for the next two decades, I had to take those months off...
"One of my biggest fears in life is that I don't want to be mediocre with my performances. And I felt like I was going on that path. I just felt depleted, like when you feel a sense of emptiness. I felt like there was a slight corruption in me. And so it was important for me to take that break for that corruption to go," she told PTI in an interview.
Pednekar started out as an assistant casting director at Yash Raj Films but life had other plans for her. She took a plunge in acting with the studio's 2015 movie "Dum Laga Ke Haisha”, which broke Bollywood’s conventional romantic tropes to tell the story of an overweight girl and her reluctant husband.
Since then, the actor has consistently delivered praiseworthy performances in movies such as “Toilet: Ek Prem Katha”, “Shubh Mangal Saavdhan”, “Bala”, “Saand Ki Aankh”, “Badhaai Do”, “Bhakshak”, and “Bheed”.
"It was ten years of work... I didn't have a pause. I'm an artist, not a factory and I think we forget that. My job is to give my best," the actor, who completed 10 years in the industry in 2025, said.
According to Pednekar, women artists in the industry don't have the luxury of doing one film in two years.
"We are not paid that well and I’ve to run my own house. So, we think we do three or four films and the effort is that we still choose great work. Therefore, I was like, I need to go back to doing films for the reason I started doing them, which is I love it," she said.
Asked if the lukewarm response to her recent films — “Mere Husband Ki Biwi”, “The Lady Killer”, and “Raksha Bandhan” — also led to her decision to take a step back, Pednekar said the two had no connection.
“I feel like it is not about how a piece performs, it is about what I have left in me to give," she said.
"Daldal", created by Suresh Triveni, is a psychological crime thriller series and features Pednekar as Rita Ferreira, a cop on the lookout for a cold-blooded serial killer in Mumbai.
Directed by Amrit Raj Gupta, the show is based on author Vish Dhamija’s best-selling book "Bhendi Bazaar".
"My hope for ‘Daldal’ is that it truly becomes the ‘Mindhunters’ of India," said Pednekar, referring to Hollywood director David Fincher's acclaimed Netflix series.
"After a long time, I saw intelligent writing. There's been a lot of work that's done in this genre, it's thoroughly enjoyed, and with wonderful women actors leading it. I was very curious to see, have they disrupted it? And to me, they have done it. It's not a who-dunnit, it's a why-dunnit. And yet it will keep viewers hooked on because you are invested in the characters."
"Daldal" follows Ferreira as she investigates a string of brutally planned murders that point to a cold-blooded and deeply disturbed killer. As the killings escalate, Rita is drawn into an increasingly dark and dangerous case that begins to take a psychological toll on her.
It is the darkest character of her career, one that also forced Pednekar to confront her own unresolved issues.
"I feel the show forced me to deal with a lot of my childhood trauma. Sometimes we don't even realise that we have gone through certain experiences," she said.
"When you're growing up in school, there's bullying, the kids are mean, and I felt like I've dealt with it in the best way because I have a great family. But I don't think I did. I never kept it to myself," Pednekar said.
It also brought back memories of the things that happened after she started working.
"I was 17 when I started working and there's so much (you go through). It can also be a way a man touches you on a busy street. That feeling, that touch, you'll never forget. That is trauma that my body has stored, and I remember those instances so clearly."
While preparing for the role, Pednekar said she had to decide how much of her own lived experience she wanted to bring into the character.
"She is broken, she is dark and punishing herself. I'm the opposite of that. But yet, I had to go into experiences that I had gotten over and healed from because that's what actors do. We enjoy torturing ourselves, because that's my bank of experiences," she added.
"Daldal" is produced by Abundantia Entertainment’s Vikram Malhotra along with Triveni. It is written by Sreekanth Agneeaswaran, Rohan D’Souza, and Priya Saggi.
The show, which also features Samara Tijori and Aditya Rawal, will make its debut on Prime Video on January 30. PTI KKP
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