Kalki Koechlin was last seen in Netflix’s highly anticipated show of the year, Sacred Games 2. The actress has made her mark in the entertainment industry with her outstanding performance in movies like Gully Boy, ZNMD, Margarita With A Straw among others.
Kalki who is quite actively working this year with several web series, plays, and podcasts awaiting a release this year, revealed that she is expecting a child with boyfriend Israeli classical pianist, Guy Hershberg. Talking about her love for Guy, Kalki told HT, “I wake up every morning to Bach. What I fell in love with was his [Guy’s] calm.”
Five-month pregnant Kalki spilled the beans on how she’s managing
She wasn’t in favour of embracing unexpected motherhood earlier, talking about how her mind changed Kalki said, “I don’t know when my notions began to change, but I knew that after the break up of my marriage with Anurag [Kashyap, film director], I had come to revisit many ideas.”
Kalki told Hindustan Times,
“I already feel the changes in the way I react to things. I am more deliberate, slower, more patient. When motherhood comes eventually, it brings with it a new consciousness to your sense of person. I still want to work but it is less about the rat race and more about nurturing oneself through one’s work. It becomes about infusing concentration and energy inward.”
Kalki is currently shooting for a web series and a film. Lately, she has wrapped up the shooting of a Tamil episodic film with Netflix. She is about to complete season 2 of her BBC podcats, My Indian Life. The dynamic actress is also part of an all-women cast for a play by Rehaan Engineer. The play is all set to make a debut at the Serendipity Arts Festival in Goa this year.
Kalki also spoke about the emotional and financial difficulties she faced post her divorce with Anurag. “I felt like the Japanese housewife in Murakami’s essay Sleep, not knowing what was reality and dream,” she said.
Amidst the emotional crisis, Kalki met Guy on a girl-gang trip to Israel. “By then, my heart had become more open to something consistent,” she recalled.
Pregnancy has certainly brought several changes in Kalki’s life but she doesn’t plan to take a break from her work anytime soon.
Kalki said that motherhood isn’t new for her as she has seen her brother, who is much younger than her grow up.
“Motherhood began with my brother, who is much younger than I am. I remember watching him come home from school one day, he must have been seven or eight, with a project on climate change and thinking ‘this is such a renewal of innocence’. Children take us back to the basics; remind us of what is important. Also, just wanting to experience pregnancy, of feeling this life growing inside you,” she said.
Kalki plans to welcome her baby in the world through natural water birth at a local naturalist birth center in Goa.
“I realise today that what my mother has done for me has been useful even when it has not been fun. I’m grateful she sat with me to learn French, my native language. I was snapping at Kiara (Kalki’s dog-child) the other day when she had gotten into my dustbin and while I was doing it, I could hear my mother’s voice in me. The mother in us emerges and it evolves from the mother we have had,” Kalki said.
Talking about what kind of a parent she would be, Kalki said,
“I know that I want to be an engaged parent. My concern is to connect with my child, not to have a particular rule, or expectation.”
She also revealed that the gender of her baby hardly makes a difference for her and hence she has also chosen a name that goes both for a girl and boy.