Sheeba Chaddha: An actor who proves that no role is too small to make a big impact

In Sheeba Chaddha’s gallery of mother roles woven through her filmography, she may often be pushed to the side but her impact is anything but forgettable.

If you’ve caught Bakaiti recently on Zee5, you know Sheeba Chaddha is once again doing what she does best - slipping into the skin of a middle-class woman, a mother with such ease that you forget you’re watching a performance. As Sushma, the quintessential housewife shouting at her kids to get up, serving rotis, dreaming of a boutique, and saving money from her silai machine, Chaddha brings to life yet another invisible woman from the folds of a small home who is bursting quietly with agency. What’s striking, though, isn’t just her fluency in playing these parts, it’s how she refuses to let them flatten into tropes. As if hinting that while she doesn’t mind playing a mother, she doesn’t want to be reduced to just that. And to her credit, she hasn’t. If anything, she’s rewritten what it means to play a small supporting role, especially, that of a mother on screen.

With Bakaiti, she also shares the screen again with Rajesh Tailang; this is her third time playing his wife after Mirzapur and Bandish Bandits. While the two have long worked with each other, they’ve built a kind of understated chemistry where their comfort with each other feeds right into the performances. But even when she’s not the lead, Chaddha steers any project she is a part of from the background. You remember that young girl who Nandini helps so she can run away with her lover in Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam? Yeah, that was Chaddha! 

Also Read: Bakaiti review: TVF’s Gullak’s cousin struggles to find its own voice!

Here are some of her performances that have stood out for us!

Badhaai Ho and Badhaai Do

Two films. Two wildly different mothers. In Badhaai Ho, she plays Sangeeta, Renee's bold, razor-sharp single mother. She’s independent, protective, and absolutely unafraid to call out the awkwardness of an old couple getting pregnant but it’s never from a place of malice. She just doesn’t want her daughter’s life to get entangled with too much family chaos. While in Badhaai Do, she flips the coin, as Baby, a quiet, widowed mother who doesn't entirely get her son's life but stands by him anyway. It’s a portrait of unconditional love with a touch of cluelessness. She doesn’t have big monologues but Chaddha fills her with so much heart that you feel like just hugging her and crying it all out which is exactly what Shardul does in the end as he came out to her.

Bandish Bandits

Mohini, Radhe’s mother, is not just a parent, she’s a classical musician in her own right with a complicated past. Once considered a threat to her father-in-law’s musical legacy, she now silently shoulders the responsibility of that very tradition when the male heirs flounder. Chaddha plays Mohini with quiet dignity and delicate emotion, never allowing her to fade into the background even when she was a shadow in the house only cooking food and taking care of the men of the family.

Mirzapur

In a world of guns, gore, and ambition, Chaddha’s Vasudha Pandit is an island of moral stillness until she isn't. As Guddu and Bablu’s mother, and the wife of principled lawyer Ramakant, she’s caught in the crossfire of Pandit men, a father’s ideals and a son’s survival. Her heartbreak is understated but it lingers long after the scene is over. She makes the choice to support her husband even if it means losing her children to a world she can’t protect them from. 

Permanent Roommates

Chaddha isn't just a mother in this one; she's also a mother-in-law and a widow trying to figure out life after loss. Lata Chaudhary moves in with her son, Mikesh, and his live-in partner Tanya. But the real tension isn’t between the women, it’s with her son, who becomes so possessive of his mother out of his fear of losing her like his father that he ends up robbing her of her agency. Chaddha plays Lata with warmth, humour, and a growing sense of self-respect that sneaks up on you.

Doctor G

Who says older women can’t have fun? As Shobha, Chaddha plays the cool mom who dances, makes Reels, wears skirts, and is unapologetically enjoying the second innings of her life. She’s done her part of raising her son and now she wants to live. It’s rare to see such representation of aging women and Chaddha makes Shobha both quirky and deeply relatable.

Rangeen

Possibly one of her most radical roles, Chaddha plays a mother who runs a boutique by day and a gigolo service for women by night. It’s not played for shock or sleaze but with business smarts and emotional depth. She sees desire as something women deserve to express too, and when she finds a promising gigolo, she’s savvy enough to scale it into an upscale companionship model. Chaddha owns every bit of the role, without judgement or hesitation.

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Pagglait

A grieving mother who has just lost her son, Chaddha doesn’t play this role with melodrama. She lets the numbness, the quiet breakdowns, and the confusion of loss speak for itself. In a house full of relatives performing grief, her character walks the line between genuine heartbreak and exhaustion. There’s one particularly moving moment where she just stares into the void while everyone talks around her and you realise that’s the truest expression of grief.

The long list of Chaddha’s filmography is proof that she may have been boxed into playing a mother by the industry, but what she’s done is explode the box from the inside. Each role is a variation, a twist in personality, context, class, or chemistry where she adds finely observed detail that even if she’s on screen for five minutes, she leaves you thinking about her character long after. It’s one of the reasons why her name has become shorthand for small role, big impact. Because Sheeba Chaddha never just plays the mother figure - she reimagines her, each time.

Which of her roles left a lasting impact on you? Let us know in the comments below!

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