Patralekhaa has been in the busiest phase of her career in the last one year, with three releases in the span. While she tasted success on OTT, her recent big screen outing Phule failed to rake in big numbers. However, Patralekhaa is unperturbed by the box office collection of the film impacting her future career prospects.
“If you do your job well and you’re good at it, I feel that people also understand that you cannot attach the failure of a film or the complete success of a film to a particular actor in that movie. That’s why there are so many actors that are still so relevant and working. It doesn’t matter whether their films fail or not, they still do get work,” she says.
The actor also acknowledges the lull that the industry is going through currently. “Yes, maybe the numbers are not doubling up and we’re not getting that huge big-budgeted successful film, but I don’t think either of us actors are thinking ‘oh my God, I have to give a ₹200 crore film next’. We’re really happy in where we are as you cannot predict the future of a film. I’m just happy that I get opportunities as I love doing this,” she shares.
For her career boom, Patralekhaa credits OTT as she says, “Back in the day, films were limiting. Your options were either you do films, or you do serials, and then they needed a prototype [of actors] for films. My journey began with Citylights (2015) which didn’t need a prototype and thus, I got that opportunity. But those opportunities were very few.”
She adds, “But then the whole OTT boom happened where amazing filmmakers like Hansal Mehta with Scam 1992 and Anubhav Sinha with IC814 came. They were writing characters and were wanting actors for those parts. Not only me but a lot of actors started getting there due to it and I feel OTT has been a blessing for most of us.”
While she admits that she never questioned the industry for lack of opportunities, she does see a change in perspective towards her now: “I see love coming from these directors and producers, who couldn’t see me in certain parts. I am seeing the love coming from my fraternity, and I feel grateful,” she says.
Amongst the industry, her biggest cheerleader has been her husband, actor Rajkummar Rao. While Patralekhaa has been getting honours for her work in the last one year, Raj has been constantly been by her side being her biggest cheerleader. Mention that and she says, “When I see it from a macro perspective, I know that what he’s doing is something so heartwarming and I love and appreciate that. I feel blessed and grateful but when I go back to see it from our relationship’s perspective, it’s a bond of friendship between us. We are best friends, and we have always been cheering for each other through our good and bad times. So, while from the other side it might seem like ‘oh my god, it’s amazing’ but for us, I feel that that’s how it always is and that’s how actually our partnership is.”
