Having now worked with Anurag Kashyap (her husband) and Dibakar Banerjee (“one of the most fascinating filmmakers of recent years”) Kalki Koechlin is in a spot when asked about her favourite director. “Now, come on, don’t do this to me,” says the 'Shanghai' actress, utterly spoilt for choice. “Anurag and Dibakar have such different styles that it’s impossible to compare. I was an admirer of Dibakar even before 'Shanghai' and he was the real reason why I wanted to do the film in the first place.”
Banerjee’s films are governed by trenchant humour that is rooted firmly in middle-class milieu and Kalki found herself attracted to that kind of humour and setting. With Shanghai, which cuts into the issues of modern-day idea of development in India, she feels Banerjee has taken a giant stride in his career. “I don’t know if I am allowed to say this, but there is no doubt that it is his best and most powerful work so far.”
As an actress, Kalki, too, has matured and glimpses of that maturity can be found aplenty in Shanghai. During pre-production, the first thing Banerjee told this beautiful actress, born of French parentage, that she must look “ugly”. But looking what she is otherwise not wasn’t a big problem, neither was, in retrospect, pruning those lovely locks. “I would do anything to get the character right,” says Kalki, as if she were a method actress. Like what? Kiss? Fed on European cinema, which is much more open-minded and treats sex casually, Kalki doesn’t understand the fuss over kissing in India. Having shot an intimate scene with her co-star Prosenjit Chatterjee, she implores that we must grow up: “What is this attitude towards kissing on screen? Don’t we kiss in real life? I am sorry to say this but it makes me feel we are still at an adolescent stage when it comes to sex.”
The actress, who first burst upon the scene with Dev.D has always held brutally candid (if polemical) views on controversial topics. This unconventionality extends to her choices of roles as well — whether as a masseur in That Girl in Yellow Boots or a young girl caught in sex racket in Dev.D, she has given a new-found boldness to the simpering Indian heroine figure. She, however, isn’t open to take the credit because as she phrases it, this transformation and change was already in the air. “Times are changing. I am just a part of this change. Indian heroines are not what they used to be. Most of my roles have been those of urban girls and you can see in cities, girls smoke and use bad language and are usually shoulder-to-shoulder to men. Films merely
reflect reality.”
Fundamentally a niche actress, Kalki enjoys the occasional leap
to commercial cinema, like she did
in Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara. In fact, she is eager to act in more such films. “I don’t go by what is commercial and what is art-house. Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara was a very well-made film. I want to continue picking such films
because more than I want to surprise my viewers, I would first want to surprise my own self.”