There is a time in every actor’s life when he feels the need to step back and reflect upon his choices. And it looks like Prateik is going through a similar phase in his life. With his last three solo outings — My Friend Pinto, Ekk Deewana Tha and Isaaq — all crashing at the box office, the actor is leaving no stone unturned to make sure that his future projects don’t meet a similar fate. The conversation we have at Prateik’s new house — he shifted out of his maternal house a couple of months back — is sprinkled with terms like ‘being more cautious’ and long periods of silent contemplation. He’s slightly under the weather, and his barely audible voice is not just because of the cold. Prateik has always been a (very) soft-spoken guy and we often have to resort to lip-reading during the interview.

He isn’t moping at home. Instead, he’s working on building the right physique and making sensible choices when it comes to work. “I’m raring to go,” he tells us, once we have settled ourselves comfortably on the sofa in his one bedroom apartment in Bandra. “I’m just being more cautious now, that when the time comes to present the film to the audience, everything is in place,” he says. Never for a moment, even when his films were not doing well, has he doubted his abilities. “I enjoy my job. I love the idea of telling stories through the characters I play,” he says.