Happy birthday Bobby Deol: When the actor would get irritated on being called 'behenji'

Happy birthday Bobby Deol: The actor had once narrated a funny incident from his childhood when people would mistake him for a woman over phone and address him as 'behenji' and how it would irritate him no end.

Actor Bobby Deol had a golden run in 2020 even as much of the entertainment industry was bleeding due to the coronavirus pandemic. The actor saw a resurgence in his career with not just one but two releases on the OTT platforms - Netflix film, Class of 83, and MX Player original series, Aashram.

Playing author-backed roles, the actor won applause for essaying two very different roles. From playing an upright police officer struggling against an unforgiving system to essaying a conman, a religious preacher, Bobby showed his reach as an actor. For the longest time, since his debut in Barsaat (1995) he has mostly appeared in Bollywood-style romances or comedies. His career saw a major slump after 2013, only to show up in 2020.

Hailing from a prominent family, Bobby has had his fair share of struggle despite being a star kid. Over shadowed by his older brother Sunny and father, veteran actor Dharmendra, Bobby has taken a long time to break free of their influences and develop an identity of his own. In one of his older interviews, he had spoken about how, when was much younger, he had to struggle with his rather 'patli' (thin) voice. He mentioned how he would get irritated when people would called him 'behenji (sister)' over the phone.

Speaking to a portal about whether he had ever played a prank or made blank calls to people, Bobby recalled: "When I was a kid, meri awaaz bahot patli thi (my voice was rather thin and reedy). Obviously as you grow older and mature, your voice changes. But at that time whenever I would pick up the phone at home, people would presume I was a girl. They'd ask "Behenji, Dharamji hain ghar par?" and I used to get irritated initially. In hotels, you know, you can dial room numbers and can just talk. I used to call up people randomly, or if someone called, I'd just talk as if I was a lady, just to have some fun... bachpan ke dinn thhe woh (those were the days of my childhood)."

The actor will be seen next in Shah Rukh Khan's new production, Love Hostel. The film will also star Vikrant Massey and Sanya Malhotra. Bobby will also be seen in Apne 2, a family franchise that will also see Dharmendra, Sunny and Sunny's son, Karan Deol.

Speaking about the slump in his career, he had told Bollywood Hungama: “When you pity yourself, you will start cursing the world around you. That is what happened with me for two-three years. I started pitying myself and thought that no one wants to work with me so I relied on alcohol. I started numbing myself and then one day I realised where I was wrong when I saw it in my kids’ eyes that our father stays home all day long.” He added, “I saw the same emotion in my mother and wife’s eyes too, so something in me changed and I realized that if I want to move forward, I cannot wait for someone else to do it, I will have to walk myself. That is when I started working on myself and I have been so busy in the last two-three years.”

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