Celebrity Scoop: Archie Panjabi

Archie Panjabi is less strident than her character, the complex and smart Kalinda, on CBS' "The Good Wife."

Her portrayal of Kalinda, who seems to have all the answers and an endless cadre of sources to solve cases, earned Panjabi an Emmy Award last year.

"I won't say it has changed my life," Panjabi says of the Emmy. "It has definitely given me a little more confidence. It is hard to say how it has affected my work because I'm still on 'The Good Wife.' It definitely makes me a lot more challenged to keep everything interesting and exciting."

Panjabi relies on her instinct a lot, as she did when reading the initial script for the legal procedural and on initially becoming an actor.

"I have always known," she says. "It was what my whole life was structured around."

The daughter of schoolteachers, Panjabi spent a few years in Bombay but the majority of her life in England. She loves living in New York.

"It is very hard to fall out of love with New York," she says. "So many things are always happening I always feel I haven't done enough."

Her ideal day would have her rise relatively late and lounge while reading "the entire Sunday supplements without being disturbed," she says. "And having a nice big pot of freshly brewed tea, and maybe some sausages on a very low gas, and while I am reading the paper they could simmer away.

"I'd go for a long walk and meet someone for lunch," Panjabi continues, enjoying the fantasy of the ideal day. "And go to the cinema and a play and meet some friends for a drink. We are so busy with work that we forget how nice it is to unwind and relax, and we feel guilty if we relax."