Pallavi Joshi: ‘I was never brought up to be a potential wife or a mother but a working person’ - Exclusive

She was raised to be an independent individual, and not someone who would only agree to society's decided roles and tags. When she ventured into acting, she wasn’t hungry for limelight but substance. Her craft craved for stories that had calibre, and her head and heart never feared the responsibility the profession carried. She is none other than Pallavi Joshi, the Indian actress and screenwriter, who brought both fictional and historical characters to life with utter honesty. During our sepcial segment, TOI Women, she shared insights into what shaped her career and the strong ground rules that have helped her carve her own niche in the industry.

A product of the Joshi household

Performing arts quite literally run in the Joshi family. “I come from a family of artists. It all started with my grandmother, Vimal Ghaisas, who was a very famous stage and Marathi film actress. So she basically planted the seed of talent in films, literature, and theatre. It was followed by you know the rest of her family. My father was actually working for Gandharva Natak Company,” shared Pallavi.




With a lineage like that, it is obvious that Pallavi’s decision to choose projects that matter and have something real to tell comes both through her family’s guidance and through her own instinct. “I think organically, toh meri leaning thi thodi towards doing something which had substance, jisme thoda acting ko leke challenge ho, jiski kahani achchi ho, jiski directors achche ho (I had a natural leaning towards doing work that had substance, that challenged me as an actor, that had a good story and good directors),” she said.

“And of course, being a product of the Joshi household, toh ek wo naturally sabka yeh hi rahta tha ki yeh dekho is project ka kya calibre hai (naturally, everyone would focus on the calibre of a project),” mentioned the ‘Kashmir Files’ actress.

Pallavi Joshi was raised to be an independent individual before anything else

As she spoke about her career further, Joshi mentioned, “You need to concentrate on characters where you can do something new, something extra. But of course, wo thoda sa ek women’s emancipation wala jo tha, ek angle wo mera apna tha (the women’s emancipation angle was my own personal inclination).”

She continued, “Obviously, mujhe is tarah se, I was never brought up to be a potential wife or a mother. I was always brought up to be a working person (I was never raised with the idea that I must become a wife or mother; I was raised to be an independent working person).”

Pallavi Joshi and her love for the craft

For the not-in-the-know, Pallavi Joshi started working when she was only 4 years old. A journey thus started, took her to new heights with every new project. Interestingly, with every new project, there's a new learning, a lot of research, and the responsibility of being creative without losing the character’s authenticity, and Pallavi checked all the boxes.

“There is a process to acting,” she said before adding, “Toh on-set behaviour jo hota hai mera, usme main wo role apne sar pe leke nahi baithi (On set, I don’t carry the weight of the role on my head constantly). That’s because I have worked in all three mediums — films, television, and theatre. Aur teeno mediums ka approach bahut alag hota hai (and the approach to all three mediums is very different).”

She added, “Jahaan theatre mein aapko ek continuity of emotion milti hai (In theatre, you get a continuity of emotion). You can fully absorb yourself in that emotion and carry it forward linearly. Films are different; there are retakes, toh kabhi emotional scene mein aapka outburst itna nahi hona chahiye ki doosre take ke liye aapke andar kuch bache hi na (you shouldn’t exhaust yourself emotionally in one take to the point that nothing is left for the next).

“But I do a lot of homework. Jab tak character poori tarah andar na chala jaye… agar aadhi raat mein koi mujhe Pallavi ke bajaye Radhika bulaaye toh main Radhika ki tarah behave karun (Until the character fully seeps in — so much so that if someone wakes me at midnight and calls me by the character’s name instead of my own, I should respond like the character). Until then, you keep working on the script. When you portray reality, you carry a huge responsibility. You cannot present a real person incorrectly,” she concluded.