‘Unfiltered,’ that’s the word I settled on after toying with a few adjectives to describe Kalki Koechlin. I don’t use the term loosely; Koechlin’s openness, one can imagine, is often misunderstood. But in a world where spouting cliches or riling up keyboard warriors with disparaging dialogues for views and numbers seems to be the norm, Koechlin is refreshingly honest. And her social media is an extension of that. Koechlin’s authenticity shines through when she expresses, “I don’t feel the need to put up a front on my social media. I don’t filter my thoughts too much.”
Koechlin is fiercely protective of her time, picking projects carefully and only the ones that adjust to her need for family time. She explains that perhaps this is why work has been a little slow. “I guess I’ve always been quite choosy, but more so now. It has to really tug at me to do it and to be away from Sappho for long periods of time. Also, it needs to be accommodating. It needs to accommodate the fact that I’m a mother. So, if the production does not understand that I need family time or that my daughter is coming on the set with me, then I don’t do it. These things are very important to me, and I am pretty clear about those demands. Not everybody is able to accommodate that so that also reduces the amount of work.”
She doesn’t seem to mind this, instead, Koechlin is undaunted and unhurried. She says, “I have been doing my piece on motherhood, which is called I’m Okay and I do enjoy that a lot. But I haven’t had much film or TV work. I have done a Tamil film, which I just finished dubbing for, and it was a big challenge because, you know, my Tamil is a bit rusty, and I had to work hard to get back to that level that I needed. I play a lawyer, so there’s a certain amount of technical language. It’s by Vishnu Vardhan, and he’s a really fantastic director–that should be coming out in August.”
She juggles the many hats she wears with ease, and now she’s an author too. We discuss the process of writing a book. Koechlin says, “Being an author is not too different from the kind of writing I’ve been doing for myself over the years, whether it’s writing The Skeleton Woman, a play, or The Living Room, another play, or some of the monologues, or the poetry. It’s always been a form of expression. When I struggle with a certain aspect of life, I want to articulate for myself rather than anyone else. So, it is therapy in many ways. Of course, having it out there in public is a different kind of excitement. It’s great to hear people who are pregnant and excited about the book saying, ‘Thank you for talking about this’. And yes, it’s nice to have a community that grows because of that sharing.”
She lets us glimpse her quiet time, revealing, “Winding down after a long day is something I took for granted before I had Sappho (her daughter), and she needs every moment of me. When she’s fallen asleep, I have those two or three precious hours, and I value that time a lot. Of course, I need to spend about half an hour catching up on texts and emails because I tend to keep my phone away when I’m with my daughter. I also make lists of movies and shows I want to watch and books I want to read, and I get onto those. I have to squeeze in some dates to keep my relationship alive, too. So, once a week, we try to go out, me and my guy, just for ourselves.”
ELLE India Editor: Ainee Nizami Ahmedi, Photographer: Farhan Hussain (Feat.Artists), Fashion Editor: Zoha Castelino, Asst. Art Director: Sanjana Suvarna (cover design), Words: Mansi Shah Makeup: Mary Rin, Hair: Jason B , Bookings Coordinator: Anushka Patil, Assisted by: Komal Shetty (styling); Sumaiya Sayed (photography), Production: Dilip Borkar1, Artist’s Publicity: Straight Talk Communnications, Video Team: Farhan Hussain and Ali (Feat.Artists)
