Kalki Koechlin held out much promise with her debut film Dev D in 2009 — something she lived up to through gritty and grey roles in Shaitan and That Girl in Yellow Boots . Despite being perceived as one in her element playing dark brooding characters, she moved on to more cheerful mainstream Bollywood roles in films like Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara and Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani . Even with her Bollywood plate full, Kalki has always gone back home — to theatre. She was recently in Bangalore, as part of the cast for Atul Kumar’s play Trivial Disasters , in which she essayed five roles. Her recent separation from filmmaker-husband Anurag Kashyap has meant that people have started looking at her as someone who’s got a mind of her own, says Kalki. Excerpts from an interview:
You’re touring the country with Trivial Disasters and then coming to the MetroPlus Theatre Festival 2014 festival with the play Colour Blind . What does theatre give you that Bollywood doesn’t?
Theatre is really an actor’s playground. There’s nothing like performing for a live audience. Ego-wise also, because you get this goose-bumps-and-applause thing. Also your subtleties as an actor are in play because you don’t have retakes. It doesn’t matter what day you’re having, good or bad, once you come to the rehearsal hall, you leave everything behind. When you’re on stage, you’re in the show. That’s the thing I love to come back to. I always get sharpened as an actor.
You were planning to direct a play….
I am planning, and now I’m scared I have to do it because everybody is talking about it (laughs). But I do have a play I’ve written. Right now it doesn’t have a very good title. It’s called A Play On Death. It’s a comedy about death. It’s a thing we all fear and have to face in our life. What if it’s seen in a funny light? I love it and am excited to do it but I need a good clean two months to direct that. I have actors in mind, we’ve done readings already. It’s just that I need the head space to do it. I can’t run off to shoot in between.
Has Bollywood’s perception of you changed in the last five years you’ve been there?
I don’t know, you have to ask them ( laughs ). I mean I’m sure it has. I think I may be a little more approachable. In the beginning they weren’t sure if I was… I don’t know, …because I was with Anurag. There was this kind of distance that ‘Oh she’s very very serious’ and now that people know me very well – people like Ayan (Mukerji, who directed Yeh Jawaani… ) think I’m a silly joker and a clown and there’s a lot more of that personal relationship that’s built up because of people I’ve worked with, including Zoya (Akhtar who made Zindagi… ). But I think I’ve always been sort of candid and there are no surprises there. I think I’m still the same person.
What about your perception of Bollywood? Has that also changed?
Yeah, I would say it’s changed in the sense that I have a lot more respect for celebrities. Before, I probably thought ‘You know everybody does the same thing’ — going out and making similar movies and similar songs. But now I see the work and effort that goes behind it, from each and every actor, in their own way to try and do something that they haven’t done before. I think it’s also a system — we are all part of a system that is a business model more than a craft or an art form. Cinema for a long time, specially in the 90s has been pretty much formula, and a business model. Now slowly it’s starting to become about cinema again, with independent work, and documentaries and other forms also coming in. Bollywood is changing and I’m excited about it.
Has your separation from Anurag changed your creative perspective in any way?
because you were also together in a creative sense?
Has it changed? Well, no! I think hat’s what keeps us friends even now. I just gave him feedback on the edit of his latest film Bombay Velvet. He keeps seeing my plays. That creative sort of, I don’t know ( searches for word ) feedback we have for each other is still there. I think maybe the perspective has become different because now people see me as being on my own, and that I’m doing things on my own. I always was. But everyone used to think that everything was backed by Anurag. People now think ‘Kalki has things to say of her own, and she has a mind of her own’. I’ve always been like that. But people think I’m suddenly talking about women. But my first play The Skeleton Woman was based on a very feminist book The Woman Who Runs With Wolves . I’ve always been interested in these topics but suddenly the perspective of people about me has changed. It’s just that I’m a little older, and I have to drink green tea ( giggles ).
This year you have four films coming…
Three! There’s Happy Endings, Margarita With A Straw, Jia Aur Jia and oh yeas, a short film Severed Ties . I don’t know if that will ever come out because we don’t have a medium for their release. Happy Endings is a romcom, done by Raj and Krishna DK who have a great sense of comic timing in their writing. I play and overly obsessive, overly in love girlfriend.
I also have done Margarita…, about a teenaged girl with cerebral palsy, who’s exploring her sexuality. It’s a topic not talked about because we assume people in wheelchairs don’t have sex. It talks of how they desire the same things we desire. Jia Aur Jia is like my first proper fun, masti Bollywood film. I have a full on dance number. What I love about the script is that it’s a totally girl bonding film. You have so many guy bonding films but we don’t have any. Queen was one. And you have female leads now with people like Vidya Balan but we don’t have a chick flick about two girls having fun. So I really enjoyed the idea of doing something different from what I’ve been doing; it doesn’t mean I’m going to stop doing intense films.
Does this these kind of films mean you’ve broken the white-girl-in-Bollywood barrier?
A little bit. I think a lot more people accept that I’m Indian, though I’m white. In Yeh Jawani Hai Diwani there’s no explanation for my character. I think that’s great. In Margarita… , I’m a Punjabi girl. Definitely I’ve broken that. Of course it will always be there. I can’t be a south Indian village girl. It will be very difficult for me. I’ll have to do some skin grafting … there are certain ways to push the barriers.
Is coming to Bangalore like coming home?
Yeah of course. My dad is here. It’s great to come home always…coming home to good south Indian meals or Andhra food is always a pleasure. My dad’s in Whitefield so I go there a lot.
I tend to hangout at Jagriti, Chez Mariyanck - a French restaurant, Nagarjuna, Koshy’s, Toscano, Grasshopper. I come in quietly to Bangalore and hang out at home.
If women are left as a mystery…
Kalki had co-led a video campaign “It’s your fault” parodying how people blame women for rape, a campaign that went viral on the Internet. She’s been hearing of the rape of the six-year-old in Bangalore, the outrage and protests.
She talks of what is essentially going wrong, and why are we not able to do anything about it. “I think firstly we have to realise this has always been existing. It’s jus that now it’s getting a lot more attention, so we feel there are a lot more cases. Thank god, now it’s being highlighted and discussed. I feel unfortunately there is no sort of radical overnight change that’s going to happen because it comes from being deeply rooted in our social and conventional education system. We don’t discuss these things at home; we are constantly being overprotected by our parents and families. There’s no social support for a pregnant teenager, there’s no one you can call; no helpline. You still have separation of boys and girls in classrooms. We don’t have a sense of partnership and equality there; and if we don’t have it there it’s not going to come later.”
“If the woman is left as a mystery, as sort of distant and difficult to reach, then she’s always going to be that thing you need to possess and conquer. I think its very strong mentality we have from a young age. That needs to change and that’s not going to happen overnight. It requires a lot of reform and it’s a painfully slow process of introducing reform. Then I guess law-wise we don’t have the implementation. It’s great it’s being highlighted and is putting pressure on the government… I don’t know what the solution is – the more discussion and protest there is about it, it will push for change. It’s not a simple solution.”
