MUMBAI: South star Prithviraj Sukumaran believes learning the art of detachment from his work has helped him in navigating the highs and lows of his career with ease.
Prithviraj, who has featured in over 100 films since his debut in 2002, says it's crucial to take a step back after the completion of a project to avoid getting sucked into the trap of a film's fate dictating one's state of mind.
"I am detached with the eventualities of my films. When I do a film, I throw myself into it more than 100 per cent. There has never been a film I have finished thinking I didn't give it my best.
"But the moment I am done working on a film, I mentally start walking away from it. If a film of mine is a spectacular success or a disappointing failure, it will not affect me," the actor said.
Prithviraj has witnessed success throughout his career; if the early phase was dominated by hits like "Classmates" (2006), "Ayalum Njanum Thammil", "Celluloid" he continued his streak with blockbusters in the last decade with "Ennu Ninte Moideen", "Ezra" and his directorial debut, "Lucifer", starring veteran actor Mohanlal.
But the 39-year-old actor said he is immune to the fate of his films.
"I am neither going to wallow in misery in the eventuality of a failure nor painting the town red, partying for a week if it's a success. Once you have mastered the art of detachment, you shield yourself against that pressure as well. Because all that pressure is happening at a time when I have already moved on from the film," he said.
The gift of detachment wasn't with Prithviraj since the beginning of his career, as the actor said he only started to look at his projects objectively after going through his share of dizzying highs and crushing failures.
"This detachment has come over the years, it wasn't always there. It came through years of extreme highs and disparaging lows, going through all emotions. It came through me giving my heart and soul to films and then those projects not working, through breezily walking through a film where I felt that was no effort at all but that film going on to become a smash hit," he added.
The actor, in his career of nearly 20 years, has worked across Malayalam, Tamil, Hindi and Telugu films.
Even when the cinema halls were shut last year due to the coronavirus pandemic-induced nationwide lockdown, Prithviraj continued to have releases on various streaming platforms.
His last three projects, "Bhramam", "Cold Case" and "Kuruthi" released digitally to varied success and Prithviraj said transitioning to the OTT space was not difficult for the Malayalam film industry.
"We have always been a content driven industry. The transition to the pandemic phase of filming was not as big for us. A lot of us were thinking and dreaming big, of making those large scale canvas films just pre pandemic, because of what films like 'Lucifer' did.
"But it wasn't as tough for us to go back and say, 'Let's put all those biggies on hold for a while and pick up these smaller scripts that all of us have.' In general too, our industry is going through a great phase where writers and filmmakers are making excellent films," he added.
The actor said it is a privilege to be part of the entertainment industry at this juncture of time.