PremiumKonkona Sensharma on Killer Soup - Was not concerned with my character's morality; whether she's right or wrong, it doesn't matter | Exclusive
In an exclusive interview with OTTplay, Konkona Sensharma opened up about embracing complexity in Killer Soup.
Last Updated: 07.04 PM, Jan 27, 2024
Playing a character with negative shades is challenging as well as exciting for many actors. Challenging because, while playing the lead actor, being an anti-hero comes with a lot of reflections from the viewers, and several social media discourses are proof. Interestingly, for the first time in a very long time, Konkona Sensharma played the role of a cunning woman with grey shades in the Netflix series Killer Soup. The actor's last outing on the OTT front was as a saviour as well as a domestic abuse survivor in the Prime Video series, Mumbai Diaries.
Early lessons in character interpretation
During an exclusive interview with OTTplay, Konkona talked about how she doesn't judge the morality of a character while playing it. The actor exclusively told us, "You don't have good or bad when you're playing a character. And very early, I think, in the first film I did as an adult, I was playing a very psychotic teenager who's stalking this older man. [While squirming] See, even now, how I'm talking about that character? So when I was very young, I had this thing of being a little judgmental towards the character that I was playing. And at that time, my mother, that acting coach, Subrata Sen, the director, helped me, like when I was so young, what weapons does she have, or she is just 18 years old, so don't judge the character so much, whatever. A little bit had happened to me, I think, right at the beginning of my career when I was very young. I wasn't sure that I wanted to continue with acting or whatever."
The actor-filmmaker further said, "But I think after that, Swati (her character in Killer Soup) has also come to me after I've been acting for 20 years. I was not concerned with Swati's morality; whether she's right or wrong, it doesn't matter. It's nice to play complex characters, and actually, many times Swati intended to kill. She didn't need to, because something happened, but she may have had the intent to kill, and honestly, that is the main thing. If you have the intent to kill, you're a killer. Whether you have executed it or somebody else has executed it, you are ready to kill."
Human complexity and subjective morality
Further speaking about a character being a good or bad person, Konkona went on to say, "Actually, you're dealing with human beings; it doesn't matter. It's not that we have to deal with only good people and only bad people; ideas of good and bad are also subjective. It's interesting to tell a story, say, about two villains and their love story; that is also an interesting thing. So then you can be concerned with morality, which becomes very superficial. "
She also said, "(It) says the most about that audience," about social media discourse on character judgement.
Exploring the dynamics of love in Killer Soup
On talking about the love story between Manoj Bajpayee and her in Killer Soup, Konkona stated, "She also kind of seems to fall in love with him through the show. She's not really so loving in the beginning, and then she sees how he stands by her continuously."
Killer Soup, created by Abhishek Chaubey, is currently streaming on Netflix.