Mrunal Thakur explains why she ‘overshares’ on social media, how things changed after Sita Ramam success: ‘It is kind of a relief’

Edited excerpts from the interview:

Sita Ramam was a big success. How have things changed for you after this film and why did you choose to be a part of Gumraah?

I am really happy in the phase that I am in right now. It’s taken me a couple of years to reach (where I am today). It is lovely when I meet filmmakers and they say ‘we are writing this specially for you, keeping you in our mind’; it is kind of a relief.

Why Gumraah? It is because it is a genre that I wanted to explore, it is something that I have never done before. The fact that I felt I am good at emotional scenes, so just take that away from me and there’s no emotion, you have to just deliver your dialogues with minimum words but it should land right there, it should pierce the audience’s heart. With Gumraah, I have broken my inhibitions. I like murder mysteries. I have always been a fan of films which are in the thriller genre. I thought if I wanted to start exploring the genre, Gumraah should be the first one to begin with.

You’ve had a fair amount of success and failure in your acting career, you have also tried TV and regional cinema before doing Hindi films. What’s the way ahead?

I don’t actually know, I like surprises. I like reading characters. Even if I am not a part of a film, I like to read scripts. I like to do characters which are out of the box. Also, often you end up setting boundaries for yourself by thinking, ‘I want to do this, I want to do that, I am not going to do this’. But there is so much happening around you… So I am open to doing everything — I started with television, did Marathi cinema, then Hindi and now I am also exploring Telugu. In the middle of all this I want to balance all three. When it comes to India, there are so many concepts and subjects which are still untouched, so many personalities who are not celebrated. I want to do something extraordinary. I am happy that today people reach out to me not as a Bollywood actress or a Telugu actress but as an Indian actress.

The film’s name is Gumraah, taking the meaning of the word out of the context here: Have you had an experience in Bollywood that misled you in anyway as an actor, and what you have learnt from it?

I have learnt from my mistakes. There have been times where, as an actor, people have told me ‘He Mrunal, everybody knows you, but people need to see the glamour side of you, so you should be able to do that as well,’ and I am like really?! But then there have also been times where I have realised that what actually matters is what my role demands. Maybe an actor also ends up choosing roles because of the phase that they are in their lives. I have followed Ram Madhavani sir’s advice. He had said, ‘Mrunal, the biggest guardian angel and strength we have is our inner voice which we don’t listen to most of the times.’

A screenshot of Mrunal Thakur’s recent Instagram story.

Your social media is filled with your stories, your fans quite connect with you, how do you maintain a balance and know where to stop?

I like to share about my life with people maybe because I have had a testing childhood. I had to change 11 schools because my dad was in a transferable job. So, when I started sharing my journey with five people, three out of those five thought that they had learnt a lot out of it. Being a Leo, I feel it is my job to share as much as I can and I want them to learn from it, and not feel like they are the only ones who are going through ups and downs in their lives. I think it is important to have a conversation and because of the rapport I have with my fans, it is important for me to let them know where I am coming from, why I did what I did, it is not like I am trying to justifying someone, but it is just my decision and I love the fact that they respect it.

Gumraah is the Hindi remake of Tamil film Thadam. You were a part of Jersey’s Hindi remake with Shahid Kapoor too, and the film’s underwhelming performance has been painful. 

Ya, because it’s a good story and I think the story which was just limited to a particular region at that point of time, I personally want it to reach out to a wider audience.

But now things are changing, I signed Gumraah three years ago, so the definition was different, there were not many movies available on the platform but now there are. I believed in the story, I believed in the character — Shivani Mathur — that I play, more than anything I believe in the director because his take was different. Although it is adopted, the plot may be similar but it’s treatment and the way it is shot is totally different.