Ridhi Dogra: I am not going to lie and say there’s no hierarchy shown towards TV and film actors, I have faced that

Nepotism might have been the debate that ruled Bollywood, but actors being differentiated and discriminated on the basis of which mediums they belong to also reared it’s head in the past many months.

Ridhi Dogra says she herself has been at the receiving end of such attitudes towards television actors, when compared to those in films. “I am not going to lie, and say ‘aisa nahi hai’. It is there. I remember, a long time back, I had posted on Instagram, like Neena Gupta ji had done ‘Ridhi Dogra, looking for work, I can transform myself’. There’s a reason why actors are telling you this,” she says.

The 36-year-old, who has been a part of shows such as Maryada: Lekin Kab Tak? and Woh Apna Sa, goes on to explain that this attitude doesn’t limit her.

“When I decided to be an actor, there weren’t 15 people lined up, saying ‘she should be an actor’. It was my personal decision, I want to do this, it doesn’t matter,” says Dogra.

The actor understands that mediums are different. “I actually spent a lot of time understanding why people say what they say. They have agenda in saying it. The TV edit pattern is different, output is different. My prep for my characters on TV was also the same as the one that I do for web shows, but the only difference is that on a TV set, I would be the only one doing it. On web, there’s a whole team doing it, so that output is far greater and quality is better,” says Dogra.

She didn’t let this change her perspective towards work. However, self doubt did creep in. “Yes, there was a time when I didn’t believe in myself. every creative person goes through this. You get those tendencies, thoughts, ‘am i good enough, should I be an actor?’ I tried to do different things, like advertisements and plays. I did a course in movement therapy, that was the time acting was not happening. I would keep sitting at home. Then when OTT space came in, it was my responsibility to figure out how to make space for myself in OTT,” she says.

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