Kaun Kona? Easily among the best!

A recurring shot in Rohan Sippyrsquos murder mystery Search The Naina Murder Case JioHotstar is of the two cops leading the said investigation Konkona Sen Sharma Surya Sharma walking sidebyside before the cameraKonkona is naturally petite barely making it to Suryarsquos shoulders Suryarsquos supposed to be the wellbuilt badass from Delhi And yet whether in that walk or any other scene itrsquos easy to tell whorsquos the more innately confidentcommanding presence on the screen Konkona of courseldquoIn my head I really feel Irsquom tall like tall tallrdquo she smilesEmbodying characters especially furthest from their selves is probably what great actors do for a living Konkona has been doing this for over two decades ldquo5560 filmsrdquo multiple NationalFilmfare AwardsShe considers herself an accidental actor still As if her professional life just happened Luck by Chance LBC so to saymdashalthough quite the opposite from the luckless female lead she played in Zoya Akhtarrsquos debut film by the same nameWhich is odd given she is actordirector Aparna Senrsquos daughter And thatrsquos how I first knew of her as a lateteenmdashobserving Konkona from a distance wearing a black festival totebag near the cafeterialdquoWoah shersquos been to Karlovy Vary film festival thatrsquos pretty coolrdquo I whispered in my head We went to the same college Delhirsquos St Stephenrsquos over the same yearsThe other college memory I have of hers is everyone around praising her performance as Goddess Kali in a production of Girish Karnadrsquos Hayavadana Otherwise you heard saw little of herShe says ldquoSince age nine Irsquove been the same mdash an introvert reading on my own for hours invisible happy to watch than be watchedhelliprdquo As a character trait one usually associates performative narcissism with mainstream actorsldquoBut there are all kinds of actors mdash not everybody wants attentionrdquo she rightly suggestsAlso not many will admit this as she does ldquoIrsquom a bit of a snob By which I mean Irsquove high standardsrdquo As a film buff she grew up mainly on world cinema and regional arthousemiddleoftheroadItrsquos just that when you chat with her mdash as I do for the first time with the camera on mdash you sense an easyengaged conversationalist wholly defying the selfdescription Observe the overtly expressive eyes in particular that in its natural dance could hold a stage performance of its ownNational audiences first experienced Konkona in Aparna Senrsquos Mr and Mrs Iyer 2002 She wouldrsquove preferred a Tamilian brahmin for the eponymous roleItrsquos just that her mother ldquotrickedrdquo her into travelling to Chennai for research Her National Award for the film instantly alerted Bombay filmmakers to a fresh talent in townUp until then Konkona says she was looking up classified ads for jobs vacant ldquoMaybe something in advertising publishing journalismhellip Things you do after an English HonoursrdquoWhat chiefly followed Mr and Mrs Iyer can best be described as Konkonarsquos own Mumbai trilogy mdash Madhur Bhandarkarrsquos Page 3 2005 Ayan Mukerjirsquos debut Wake Up Sid 2009 Zoyarsquos LBC 2009All three bound by a common thread of the outsiderrsquos gaze from a young independent girl respectively from Bhilai Kolkata Kanpur shining a light on the lsquomaximum cityrsquo why even Anurag Basursquos Life in a Metro 2007Whether by destiny or design these films established her as a uniquely understated voice in the mainstream More so because theyrsquove withstood the passage of time As have several films leading up to themIMO her most underrated movie Aparna Senrsquos 15 Park Avenue 2005 My favourite Rituparno Ghosh film Dosar 2006 starring Konkona Prosenjit Chatterjee Perhaps her most adored movie still Vishal Bhardwajrsquos Omkara 2006The Sharma in Konkona Sen Sharma I learnt only much later stands for her late father Mukul Sharma Everyone of my vintage can recall Mukul from the staple science brainteaser column Mindsport in the Sunday Times of IndiaShe describes Mukulrsquos more professionalfuturist writing with the same word for her grandfather Chidananda Dasguptarsquos work as film critichistorian ldquodenserdquo expression for academic Besides her love for Calvin amp Hobbes Mukulrsquos better known contribution to Konkonarsquos professional life is of course her directorial debut Death in the Gunj 2016 that as a period film stood out for such visceral feeltextureIt was based on a story inspired by true events that Mukul would narrate to his lirsquol daughter ldquoagain and againrdquo much to her excitementKnowing that nobody would produce the script once she wrote it mdash and with a producer onboard Honey Trehan assuming that nobody would watch it anyway mdash Konkona says she made the film firstly for herself ldquoIrsquom anyway hard to pleaserdquoLikewise an anecdote about a friend walking in on their househelp making love led to her writingdirecting The Mirror that as a short film became a conversationstarter of sorts from Lust Stories 2 NetflixFrom an accidental actor she now identifies herself as a ldquoreluctant directorrdquo I suspect itrsquos this cool insouciance of simultaneously doing things and staying distant from it that draws us to KonkonaWhich is why I ask her what she makes of fame ldquoLike anything extraneous I guess it comes and goes Irsquove enjoyed a convenient level of nonintrusive fame thoughrdquoWhat about money She says ldquoItrsquos a great convenience But itrsquos not gonna solve any internal issues unless medicalrdquoMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass cultureHe tweets mayankw14 Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper