From The Girl In The City to Little Things, here's why Mithila Palkar is millennials' favourite
Mithila Palkar, who rose to fame with the popular YouTube video 'The Cup Song,' released in 2016, has become a household name. Though she made her acting debut in 2014 with a Marathi short film 'Majha Honeymoon,' her first Bollywood role as Kangana Ranaut's sister in Katti Batti didn't go unnoticed. Her journey from being a YouTuber to now an actress has been quite the adventure. (All pictures/Mithila Palkar's Instagram account)
Born into a Marathi family, Mithila Palkar is from Vasai. She later moved to Dadar with her maternal grandparents due to inconveniences in travelling. Coming from a family with no actors, it was difficult for this talent to convince her family with her acting decision.
In picture: Mithila Palkar with her grandparents.
Mithila has a sister, who has a PhD in neuroscience and is living in LA, USA. This became a huge turning point for the actress. She moved to a new city, took some acting classes from Stella Adler Studio of Acting, and honed her acting skills.
After completing her BMM in 2013 from a popular college in Mumbai, Palkar gave her first audition to Quasar Padamsee of Quasar Theatre Productions (QTP). The audition did not get her the role but Quasar gave her a job backstage, managing their theatre festival, Thespo.
After her crash course, there was no turning back for Mithila! As soon as she returned to Mumbai, the YouTuber bagged a role in a short film, and later, she was seen in Nikkhil Advani's Katti Batti. Mithila Palkar was also seen in popular television advertisements. She later sang a song called Maharashtra Desha in association with Bharatiya Digital Party (BhaDiPa), which was released on May 1, 2016, on YouTube on the occasion of Maharashtra Day.
While struggling and trying hard to make it huge in the world of showbiz, Dhruv Sehgal, who met Palkar at Thespo (QTP's annual theatre festival), asked her to audition for Filter Copy's new satire show on YouTube called News Darshan. She not only succeeded in that audition, but also went on to do her first web series called Girl in the City in 2016 for Bindass along with a number of YouTube videos.
In picture: Mithila Palkar with her Little Things co-star Dhruv Sehgal.
Mithila Palkar, who gained fame with the web show, Girl In The City said in an interview, "Girl In The City was part of my journey in my initial days of acting and I would definitely say it has turned out to be a milestone. It has been a very important part of my career. I have been recognised as the Girl In The City and I think that says a lot."
One of these is a web series called Little Things alongside Sehgal since 2017, which achieved a lot of popularity. For the unversed, it was also published as a book by Penguin Random House. Netflix purchased the franchise of Little Things in 2018 and its second season premiered on Netflix on October 5, 2018. The third season of Little Things premiered on November 9, 2019.
Her out and out Marathi debut was Muramba, opposite Ameya Wagh, which also starred Sachin Khedekar and Chinmayi Sumit. Directed by debutante Varun Narvekar, the film garnered a lot of appreciation for its quirky storyline and impeccable performances.
In picture: Amey Wagh and Mithila Palkar during a stage performance.
If Katti Batti was her Bollywood debut, she later signed Karwaan, where she shared screen space with Irrfan Khan and Dulquer Salmaan. At a promotional event, Mithila mentioned how Irrfan turned out to be her acting school. "Initially it took me time to realise that I am sharing screen space with Irrfan Khan. But when I started working with him, a lot of times I would end up laughing in a scene."
In picture: Dulquer Salmaan with Mithila Palkar at the promotional event of Karwaan.
"I have never been to an acting school and on the sets of 'Karwaan', Irrfan was my acting school. By observing him, I learnt to improvise in the scenes along with focusing on the smallest of the details."
Now, after her stint in the slice-of-life film, Mithila Palkar will be starring in Tribhanga, a digital film. Helmed by none other than Ajay Devgn Ffilms, the online movie shares the story of a dysfunctional family, with Kajol, Renuka Shahane and Tanvi Azmi in pivotal roles.
In picture: Manav Kohli and Kajol with Mithila Palkar on the sets of Tribhanga.
In fact, in an exclusive interview with mid-day, Mithila Palkar, who was ranked the most successful in Forbes 30 under 30 list of 2018, said, "I did not expect this to happen so soon. The way the news was broken out to me was, 'Oh! Okay, this has happened.' It was quite surreal. I don't know what my idea of success is because I believe in just keeping at your work, anything that you do and it makes you happy that is a success for me."
In picture: Mithila Palkar with elder sister Radhika.
Mithila Palkar further added, "The work that doesn't make you complacent, that you don't want to get up in the morning for is like something that keeps you going. I don't think there's anything else that I would trade for. I get asked a lot that if not an actor what would you be? But there's never an option, I always wanted to be an actor."
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