Kriti Sanon: We were two happy girls screaming on the phone

Kriti Sanon

It was a regular Thursday afternoon for Kriti Sanon. Until it wasn't. Seated in a meeting at her home that day, the actor gave in to an unrelenting caller after ignoring multiple calls from the number. She remembers the next few minutes vividly. "I got the news that I had won the National Award for Best Actor. I froze for a few seconds. I got almost teary-eyed and ran to my parents' room to break it to them," recalls the actor, who won the honour for her performance in Mimi (2021) as the 69th National Awards were announced last week.

Sanon views the honour not only as an acknowledgment of her craft, but also as the realisation of a personal wish. "This was one of the dreams that I wanted to fulfil in my career. I had written it in my personal diary. Not many actors get to live this moment," she says.

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Kriti Sanon and Alia Bhatt won the award for Mimi and Gangubai Kathiawadi respectively

With the win, the audiences' expectations from her have only risen. She knows that as she says, "If people are believing in my talent, I need to up my game." At the same time, she is also aware that films like Mimi, which explore an actor's range, don't come by easily. Apart from Laxman Utekar's directorial venture, she says only Bareilly Ki Barfi (2017) tapped her potential. "Both Mimi and Bareilly Ki Barfi were centred on my character. It tells me that the audience loves to see me play layered characters. But it's very difficult to find good scripts that you can shoulder alone. I have been trying to find such scripts." She adds that her line-up of films, including The Crew with Tabu and Kareena Kapoor Khan, gives her a chance to showcase her versatility.

A talk about the National Award win would be incomplete without the mention of Alia Bhatt, who shares the Best Actor honour with her for Gangubai Kathiawadi. Sanon reveals she called Bhatt after the awards' announcement. "She was phenomenal in Gangubai Kathiawadi. I have always admired her as an actor. I congratulated her, and we were just two girls screaming on the phone, taking it in and being happy for each other. We [said] that when we go to take the award together, we will celebrate this moment," she smiles.