Soha Ali Khan talks about being a mother, an actor and now, a filmmaker.
In the year 2017, Soha Ali Khan embraced motherhood by giving birth to a beautiful little girl Inaaya Naumi Kemmu, turned a writer with her first book The Perils of Being Moderately Famous and soon, we would see her turning into a producer. In an exclusive conversation with indianexpress.com, the actor describes these interesting facets of her life and says, “it is always good to embrace different aspects of your personality.”
“I think that it is always good to vent out and embrace different aspects of your personality. While acting was something I have been passionate about and that has been the focus of my career until now, I opened up my mind to explore other things. For example, I have always wanted to produce a film. Sometimes you wish a certain film or a subject to be made but it is not being made. So, you just say why don’t I make it,” said Soha.
The actor said she would be making a biopic on veteran lawyer Ram Jethmalani’s life. She feels his life fits well for the silver screen, “Ram Jethmalani has a fascinating life and we thought how amazingly that life lends itself to cinema. We thought if we feel so strongly about it, why don’t we produce it ourselves. That was the motivation behind starting the production company (Renegade Films).”
Soha Ali Khan described her production venture as one of the most challenging biopics. She said, “It is a challenging project. He (Ram Jethmalani) has lived for more than 9 decades. To get a story out of that and make it in a 2 and half hour film is what we are struggling with. We are working on the script. We have got a director in mind but cannot reveal until we sign the dotted lines. The project is co-produced by Ronnie Screwvala. We are planning to start filming by mid or end of this year. We want to do this as soon as possible. It is our priority. Once we finalise the script, we will cast the actors.”
Not just producing, as soon as she delivered Inaaya, Soha came back on the films set with Tigmanshu Dhulia directorial Saheb Biwi Aur Gangster 3. “It was soon after delivering. It is a small role. It has been great fun to shoot. I am glad he incorporated me in the third part. I love working with him. Even though it was short shoot, it was fun. I am not sharing the screen space with Sanjay Dutt. We did a film together earlier but not this time,” quipped the actor. However, she refused to divulge details on her character as she thinks, “the film is so intriguing that I am scared I might reveal something.”
When we asked Soha Ali Khan about motherhood, the actor says there have been many changes, including the way she travels. “I used to travel light. I never liked to stay in lines and check-ins. But now with Inaaya, you have a lot of stuff with you when you travel and you have to be very organized about it. We recently took a flight to Delhi from there to Pataudi house which is about an hour. I was worried how she would respond to it but she was quite good. Also, we have taken long drives. My concerns have always been if we have enough things to keep her entertained, nappies, milk and other necessities. The first time we were very scared but the more you do it, you become confident. Also, you become sympathetic towards people who travel with babies,” the actor chuckled.
But wherever she goes, she and her kid clicked by the photographers. However, Soha remains unaffected by this attention. She does not mind her fans having an interest in knowing Inaaya and seeing her pictures. The actor added, “No, not all. She is a part of me. I realised it became a headline that I worry about her in terms of nazar and all. Obviously, we are protective about her. Every parent is. We do everything from Kaala dhaaga to kaala teeka even if we are not superstitious as it makes someone else happy, so there is no harm in it. I worry about the attention she receives but I am proud of her. I am happy to share my happiness with her with the world but it is unfair to the kids, be it Taimur Inaaya or any child to be exposed to too much attention from media. Childhood is innocence at the end of the day.”
She doesn’t even seem bothered about Inaaya constantly being compared to her cousin brother Taimur Ali Khan. In fact, she says she finds all this ridiculous as she has dealt with it all her life. “You know, I am someone who has lived in the public eye. Comparison is something that people love to do. I was compared to my mother, my brother to our father and me to my brother. Now, Taimur to Inaaya. People enjoy it. I come across Instagram posts of Inaaya and Taimur picture together and they ask ‘which baby is cuter?’ It is ridiculous but people comment too. This is human nature. You just have to laugh at it as much as you can,” quipped the actor.
When we asked who is more careful about social media posts or public appearances of Inaaya among the two parents, Soha said, “Somedays me and somedays him.”
Soha Ali Khan narrated a cute story about how Kunal wanted to be the first one to show Inaaya to the world. “He was the first one to put up a picture on his social media. His justification was, ‘Well, now we are going to start taking her out and there’s going to be media and they will take a picture of us and we can’t control it. So, I want to have control over the first picture of my daughter that comes out. It should not be by someone else after that the world is going to see her anyway’. That made sense to me. After that, we did not put a picture for quite a long. I did post one with Taimur because it was too cute. So, there is no logic to it.”
As we came to the end of our conversation, Soha revealed that she aspires to work on her next as a writer. When we probed if screenwriting is on the cards, she quipped, “I have written non-fiction which I feel is my strength. Screenplay would require more talent but that does not mean I would not. Maybe in the future.”