Triptii Dimri: Bollywood's breakthrough star of 2024

A few rejections later, she bagged some print and television commercials, one of which was for Santoor soap. That advertisement got her to Mumbai when she was 20 and gave her the freedom she had been yearning for. “I wanted to shift immediately because I felt a sense of connect [with the city]. When I got here, I was like, ‘Wow, I can do anything, I can go anywhere’. You also feel safe as a girl in Mumbai. Freedom is something I craved,” the actor explains.

Mumbai, though, is not an easy place to survive in, especially for an outsider trying to make a mark in the hypercompetitive film industry. Dimri did feel the jitters. She lived with her manager and a few model friends, and mostly survived on khichdi. Her parents would call five times a day and she’d lie to them that she had eaten something fancy. 

The grind increasingly became a test of patience as it dawned upon her that it was a challenge to get that one role amid a sea of hopefuls. “I realised it’s so difficult to enter the industry, to find your voice, get up every day and do the same thing. It’s not easy,” says Dimri. There were times when she wanted to give up and go back, but the hunger in her meant she was willing to do the hard yards.

During her initial days, she would go for five to six auditions a day, and bag the occasional commercial, but that wouldn’t take her too far. Though it was an emotional roller-coaster, Dimri holds the experience dear to her. “It was challenging, but also a lot of fun. I learnt a lot about acting… it’s something that makes you a strong person. Had I got everything immediately, I would have been a different actor,” she says. “I am glad I went through that entire process of rejections, auditions, standing in line for hours and hours.”

While shooting the Santoor ad, the casting director of Poster Boys (2017) called Dimri for an audition and, thus, she bagged her first film. It was a small role and the big break as a lead star came a year later with Laila Majnu.

Big Break & Learnings

The filmmaker felt she would more or less do a decent job, but did not have enough faith in her when it came to intense scenes. “I thought I’d circumvent them in some way. But I did not have to… she outshone my expectations,” he tells Forbes India. “I thought I’ll have to ‘save’ Triptii, but she has saved so many scenes in the film.”

Ali says the first time he sensed a performer in her was during the interval scene where she asks Qais [played by actor Avinash Tiwary] to bugger off and cries. “She really matured while shooting the film and I don’t know how it happened,” he says. 

Dimri had high expectations from Laila Majnu, but reality hit her when she went to the theatre and saw only two girls apart from her had turned up. Taking the disappointment in her stride, she decided to opt for acting workshops. 

“Laila Majnu taught me what acting really is because I struggled for the first two months. I would be talking to my director and co-actor, who would use heavy, acting-oriented terms… I could not understand what they were talking about,” reminisces Dimri. “That’s when I decided to enroll for an acting workshop. That changed my life. It made me connect with myself as a person and fall in love with acting.” 

Acting coach Saurabh Sachdeva, who founded The Actor’s Truth, remembers Dimri had missed the first day and came late on the second. As a rule, the institute allows only two holidays a month, so Sachdeva told her sternly that she was done with the course. She, however, pleaded with him. “I could sense that she desperately wanted to do the course. She was conscious and nervous, and had come only to learn,” says Sachdeva, who is also an actor and shared screen space with Dimri in Animal later.   

“I am an introvert and don’t like attention. I sat on the last bench, in the corner,” says Dimri of her first day. Sachdeva says he chided her, saying she was working with the walls and asked her to sit on the first bench.  

Sachdeva describes Dimri as an extremely curious person. “She was silent, but she would intently listen to what the coach was saying. It was amazing the way she responded to the exercises. She performed well by the end of the course,” he says.

After Laila Majnu flopped, Ali met Dimri frequently and gauged that she was destined for something big. “I saw her vulnerable side. She didn’t know what to do once she had made a mistake,” he recalls. The actor confided to the filmmaker that she was contemplating taking an acting class. Ali tried to convince her that she did not need to. Instead, she could learn some skills like dancing, he suggested. But she was adamant. “She wanted to hone her acting skills. And that speaks volumes about her. Her intentions were clear. Glamour is not her game… she is here to do good work and here to stay,” he says.

Also read: Money is just a byproduct of what I do: Rajkummar Rao

Success & Fame 

For two years after Laila Majnu, Dimri had no work. She used this time to learn the nuances of her craft. That’s when the auditions for Bulbbul were going on. The supernatural horror drama, set in the 1880s, was among the early films to release on Netflix. People close to Dimri dissuaded her from vying for the role of a ‘witch’ in a film that wasn’t going to get a theatrical release. 

However, Dimri auditioned for it, wearing a saree and heavy jewellery. She confesses that she felt a bit disconnected at the start as she didn’t know the script. “Once [director] Anvita [Dutt] narrated it to me, I said I’ll do the film even if a thousand people told me not to,” remembers Dimri, adding that she was engrossed with the narration and told the director she is on board only to be reminded by Dutt that there was another audition. “Anvita told me to live with the scene for three to four days, and that she’ll see whether or not I have improved.” 

Dutt reveals that her casting agency, Casting Bay, found Dimri for her. “She was, I think, the 72nd audition,” says the director. “There was something about her body language that was like the younger Bulbbul. So, I auditioned her with [actor] Abhishek Banerjee. She was brilliant and receptive. After that, it was a no-brainer.”

Bulbbul got positive reviews and Dimri’s performance stood out. The actor, who subsequently featured on Forbes India’s 30 Under 30 list in 2021, credits the film and the director for her evolution as a performer. “I was a different person before and after Bulbbul. There is so much about acting that I have learnt from Saurabh and Anvita. She taught me about being a strong and powerful woman,” says Dimri.

The duo joined hands together immediately after for Qala, a psychological drama on Netflix in which Dimri plays a playback singer battling her past and tense family relationships. Having watched her blossom as an actor while shooting Bulbbul, Dutt was confident about Dimri pulling off a complex character with ease. The filmmaker believes the actor’s ability to surrender to the script and character, and her intelligence are her biggest strengths.

She hails Dimri for going against the grain and choosing author-backed roles in some of her earliest films. “For a young actor to take that call is superb… and lucky for us as filmmakers,” says Dutt. “She’s intelligent and chose character-driven stories. It requires guts to do that so early in your career.”

Qala, like Bulbbul, received a warm response and further solidified Dimri’s reputation as a solid performer. But she hadn’t encountered fame till then. She garnered all the attention with a brief role as Zoya in Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s Animal. Playing an innocent from the outside, but with devilish intentions within, she became the talking point after the film turned out to be a box office monster, earning ₹900 crore worldwide. 

The actor admits it’s the turning point of her career. “I wasn’t expecting the kind of response that my character has got. As an actor, you wait for that one role that will give you the eyeballs. And that happened with Animal,” explains Dimri. “Sandeep Sir told me it’s a small role, but I will benefit the most out of it.”

Post Animal, Dimri has been on a signing spree, but the most satisfying outcome of the 2023 film, she believes, is that a lot of people, who had not watched Laila Majnu, Bulbbul or Qala, were now audiences of those films.

Glam Doll

Along with fame and popularity, Animal also brought with it brickbats for the actor. Some spoke condescendingly about the steamy scenes in subsequent films like Bad Newz and Vicky Vidya…, many went on a rant about her ‘glam doll’ makeover while some others wondered why she featured in Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3, a film with an ensemble cast with little scope for her as a performer.  

Dimri defends these choices, saying some were made before Animal released and has a philosophical take on the criticism: “No actor is immune to it.” 

Filmmakers dismiss the notion that the glam image is detrimental to her. On the contrary, they feel the limelight will work in her favour. “The glam girl image will at least give her chances to prove herself. She’ll get the kind of films she wants to do… she is destined for more and better. And I know she will shine in everything that she does because she has the talent,” emphasises Ali.

Agrees Dutt: “Triptii is brilliant and that doesn’t change if she does a glamorous role. It will only add to her filmography. And make her reach the audience that maybe films like Bulbbul and Qala won’t.”

In fact, says Ali, Dimri would get irritated on the sets of Laila Majnu if someone praised her beauty. She would attribute it to genetics and say: “Is that all that I have? Why should my beauty cloud my personality?”

Good & Bad

Those who have worked with Dimri speak highly about her both as an actor and an individual. Actor Rajkummar Rao, who starred opposite her in Vicky Vidya…, calls her incredibly talented and a dear friend. “Working with Triptii has been an absolute pleasure. She is deeply dedicated to her art form. Her greatest strength lies in her ability to keenly observe and respond to the nuances of a scene. This is why her performances shine so brightly—they stem from a place of genuine honesty.” 

Anand Tiwari, who directed Bad Newz, says they were looking for an actor who would portray the vulnerability of the character and at the same time be able to match co-star Vicky Kaushal’s levity. “I had seen her in Bulbbul. There was a certain amount of gravity to her… cinematic-ness to her character. Having seen her range as an actor, we were confident that she’ll be able to pull off what we wanted,” he says.

The only concern was whether she could do comedy as well. Tiwari saw some YouTube videos from the streets of Delhi that Dimri had done prior to getting into films. “They are funny,” he says. “Her strengths are her absolute love for cinema and focus. Full credit to her for fully submitting herself [to the film]… she was ready to commit till the very end and that is liberating for a filmmaker.”

Sachdeva was mesmerised with what Dimri did in Animal. “She was so vulnerable. There was such an age difference between Ranbir Kapoor [her co-actor] and her, but they looked like lovers,” he says. “Even in Vicky Vidya…, she did not come across as caricature-ish. She took a genuine emotion and heightened it.”

Dimri is having a dream run, but the film industry is an uncertain place where fortunes can change in no time. She is aware of the fickle nature of her profession and says she treats acting, fame and success as a part of her life. “I cherish all of these, but there’s a different side to me as well,” says the actor.

Rao, too, underscores that the industry is unpredictable. “Triptii is fully aware of this reality. And from what I’ve seen, she’s unfazed by the ups and downs of the business—she has her head firmly on her shoulders,” he says. The actor has a word of advice for Dimri. “Keep your attention on what truly matters—your passion for acting. Success, popularity and everything else will follow.”

Dutt hopes that the future holds only great things for Dimri. “Doors have opened for her, and this will only help her career,” she says. The filmmaker is confident that the actor will continue to make the right choices. “A girl who chose to do a difficult film like Bulbbul when she was 23 is taking decisions without listening to the noise that’s out there. I know she will continue to do so regardless of what anyone says about her.”

Ali believes Dimri as the ‘it’ girl of the season is a cyclical thing that will go. “The actor in her will shine because she will get more films, and many more kind of films. I think her journey has just begun,” he says. 

Simple & Fearless

Dimri, for her part, has decided to keep fear at bay. “When I was new, I was fearless… there was nothing to lose. When you have something to lose, that’s when fear kicks in. I caught myself doing that a lot of times. And I realised it’s not going to take you anywhere,” she says. The goal, as an artiste, is to follow the heart. “The aim is to play different characters. I don’t want to go to a set and be bored. When I go back home, I have to be satisfied as an actor.” 

Whenever she gets time between shooting schedules, Dimri prefers doing acting workshops. “I perform better as a result. When you prepare for a character and go on set, you are in a different zone,” says the actor, who will be seen in Vishal Bharadwaj’s next opposite Shahid Kapoor and Dhadak 2 in 2025. At the same time, she adds: “It’s important to go on set and be nervous. When your nervousness goes away, you are in danger.” 

Tiwari says it’s heartening to see a good human being do well in life. “The sky is the limit for her. What’s beautiful about Triptii is that she is grounded. The ups and downs are not going to faze her because she has strong personal values,” he says, adding that she’s a complete foodie. When they were shooting for Bad Newz in Mussoorie, there wasn’t a day when she was not out on the streets of Mall Road, eating momos or chaat.

As an actor, says Dutt, there was something fascinating about Dimri’s preparation and process. “When she would work on the character background, without her deliberately doing so, her body language, her tics, even her voice and the cadence of her speech would start changing the more she discovered about the character. So, by the time we reached the set, she was Bulbbul or Qala all the time,” she says. On set, reveals the director, Dimri is the character. “A director’s actor.” And off sets, she is fun. “Just a normal, young girl from Delhi. No starry attitude or anything like that. She’s just a kid,” adds Dutt.

Sachdeva strongly feels the actor will have a lot of work for years. “Triptii is humble and grounded. She talks softly and respects every person. And that is why she is a good actor,” he says.

More than her talent, she is a super intelligent person, opines Ali. “She gets things quickly and the most intelligent thing that she does is that she plays dumb. She has a special knack of playing dumb and look like a fool. But she remembers stuff and gets things. You don’t have to tell her too much… she understands. The energy comes out when it has to. And after the shoot she is back to yapping… being a typical bimbo,” he says.

The director goes on to say Dimri is an extremely simple girl. “If you peel the onion, the core is very rustic. She’s real, fun-loving. She has a comforting personality… you will get immensely comfortable with her.”

At present, though, the introverted Dimri is slowly getting comfortable with her popularity. She’s waited for this way longer than for the hair and makeup session to get over.