Forensic: Prachi Desai on getting out of her comfort zone to play a complex role, her journey in the industry & more

From small screen to big screen, Prachi Desai has impressed everyone with her inspirational journey and impeccable acting skills. After giving us memorable performances in films like Rock On,  Once Upon a Time in Mumbaai , Bol Bachchan  and others, the gorgeous lady has won our hearts with her act in Forensic .

In an exclusive conversation with Firstpost, the actress shared how she got out of her comfort zone to play this complex character and more. Excerpts from the interview:

What you want to say about the overwhelming response you are getting for your performance in Forensic? What can I say? It’s an amazing feeling. I think it’s extremely rewarding as an actor. I just I think this is the kind of opportunity I’ve always wanted because I just wanted to do something different where I can surprise myself and I can surprise the audience and this is I think this is exactly what that It was personally, if you ask me, I love the genre. I love psychological thrillers, and there are some great, great films that I’ve watched, which are psychological thrillers along with roles that have been. So, surprising, and just brilliant. And I think I always hoped that I would do one of those such roles. So, this was everything for me.

What kind of prep you did for this character and did you actually watch the original film before starting the project?

So actually, I did not watch the original because I just didn’t want any of us to come with any kind of baggage. I did not want any thought process, not feeling like it’s fresh. So, which is why I did not watch the original because there’s a lot that we’ve changed in this one, at least that’s what I’ve been told and that’s what I’ve heard. Now, In fact, I will watch the original because I believe it was such a good film and I don’t want to miss out what your own watching any good films. So I’m definitely going to watch it this weekend, but I made it a conscious choice to not watch it before we started shooting for our Hindi adaptation just because I think like I said, I didn’t want any baggage. I just wanted to go in with a very fresh thought. Also, because this particular role does not exist in the original one, the one that I did. So, I thought that since this rule doesn’t exist in the original one, let me not approach this as anything where there will be kind of confusion. So I just thought I’ll approach it as a completely fresh thing.

How you prep for your role? Did you meet some of the personalities like medical experts for that?

We definitely had a forensic specialist on set. There was a lot of guidance that was taken from him as well as a team that was from Delhi. But of course, I think Vikrant (Massey) was the person who got all the advantage of that and getting to know more and more about the deeper science. That probably we are all not so much aware of in our day-to-day lives. For me, really, I think the research depended more on finding out more about the human psyche or just going into these unkind uncomfortable zones of learning more about juvenile crimes or serial killers and that kind of information, which honestly in our day-to-day lives, I mean, it’s not something that you just wake up on a good day and decide to read about. Of course, it’s all incredibly interesting proud, of course, criminal psychology students live and breathe all of this information day in and day out. But on a day-to-day basis for us, apart from like watching crime thrillers or crime dramas, this is not the kind of information where we dig very deep into more so about the human psyche about how people’s minds work. So that kind of stuff. It was very interesting at the same time as an actor how I wanted to approach it or how I wanted to imbibe that or use any of that information on screen was completely up to me. There was, of course, very limited stuff that was on paper, which was mostly the dialogues if I have to put it very bluntly, just the lines. But what I wanted to do with those lines was actually fully up to me and I don’t know what crazy in I channelled. But this is what came out.

What was the reaction of your parents and close friends as they might be surprised seeing you in this kind of character just like us? Absolutely! You know they were super thrilled and shocked at the same time because nobody saw it coming. I did not share this with anyone actually. I did not tell my closest friends, my friends my family nobody that this was the nature. It was really difficult to sort of seal the lips but I tried to keep that information with myself for so long. In fact, I was watching the film with some of my cousins and you know through the film, they were trying in front of me, they were trying to guess who the killer is. And it was so funny because, on one hand, I was hoping that they don’t take my name and rightly so they can they kept giving all the wrong answers and they kept guessing all the wrong names but at this point in passing, they were like, oh my God!  You know, could it have been you but how can be you? And I was like, okay, this isn’t a good zone. Nobody’s there guessing or imagining that this could actually be me and which is why the shock at the end I think was a very genuine one. I myself think I really like that surprise factor. So it was pretty great.

Some characters are so complex and intense for example this character, stays with you for a long time. So, whenever there is a pack-up and you go home, how do you detox yourself from that character?

Even if it’s a simple role to pull off, something, that’s not very complicated, or not in a grey zone at all, even if it’s just like a nice simple role. Even that really plays on your mind for a long time. Also, because you kind of like you kind of just live in that world for given number of days or give a number of weeks or months and then on every set it’s like this set of people becomes your family for that given time. Which is why it’s very difficult to then sort of step out of that and then go into a different one again. But with characters like these, which are extremely complicated, which are emotionally very challenging. Because there’s a lot more work also that you have to put in. There’s a lot of things that play on your mind for longer because you are overthinking it in the first place just to try and make sense of all of it to begin with. And then you’re going into the darkest areas to kind of channel all of those feelings and bring that out on screen and on the camera. So, which is why this becomes even more difficult to get out of, but I think over the years I think whatever experience that I have, that really helps because that there is a point at which you are going to have to detach. So for me, I had a certain approach to this for sure. Whatever mental work I did on myself that I did, but I made sure that I was not, I was not going back to my home or my hotel room back with that, I was making sure that once the day on set is over, I will not reel in it and I will try and not think of it all. Which kind of helps. It has to be a conscious effort and it’s more about having a strong mind. That is what I had to do. But honestly, I think in those beautiful hills and mountains of Mussorie really helped. There is so much Beauty around that. If you really want to kind of just divert your thoughts and mind into something, all you have to do is just look around you and that’s what I did. I just would then start taking in all the beauty that was around me rather than rather than thinking of all the deep stuff.

Whenever you are doing two projects simultaneously or there is very less gap between the first and second project and one character is dark character and the other is a very girl next door. So, how you switch from one to another like do you go through any kind of process?

So, sometimes you realize that you have brought a little bit of the baggage from your previous one on to the next one, if there’s a very small gap. But that is only because acting is all about mind games it’s just about how you train your mind to think or how you train your mind to be. But the best part is that it always takes you, most actors will tell you this, it takes you about two days like one day or two days to get into the new zone. Because in the first two days you’re just getting comfortable with the people around. You are getting to know them, you’re getting to know who this person is really that you’re playing. It’s always the third day when you really get into it and you start having so much fun with it. At least that’s how it is for me. On the first day, it’s all about figuring out who this person is that I’m playing today, but it’s my third day where I start enjoying myself the most. So, sometimes the baggage happens if you know that role particularly was a very physically, as well as mentally challenging one. But as actors you have to really conceal that, then you have to If you train your mind to think differently and also you need very smart directors to be able to tell you that, hey, you know, you’re looking like this person from this film, so, snap out of it, because, sometimes this happens, suppose you’re playing a cop in your previous film and say, you’re supposed to play a normal person like a girl next door in your next. You never know when they may be a slight hang in your body language. These are all very minute things. So, it’s just as an actor, how much you want to think of and how much you want to cover. That all of this like plays a part in it.

You started your career with TV, then you featured in Bollywood films, and now you’re doing a Telugu TV show. It’s kind of a mixed bag. So how do you sum up your journey?

I think a mixed bag is a good word you used. I think it’s been the most amazing variety of things that I actually never imagined. My career, my life has just taken me through all of these waves, from television to movies to OTT to web series. I just feel incredibly grateful to be around at a time, when we have all of these avenues available and I’m loving exploring each one of them. So, I’d say that my journey has definitely been one of the most unconventional ones and yeah and something that I’m thoroughly thoroughly grateful for I don’t know what more really we are going to see you know in the next decade or so. Because, a decade ago, we definitely didn’t have OTT and all of these avenues. So, I want to see what more, what next

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