December 7, 2017
"She's woken up," Soha Ali Khan exclaimed before
she hung up to attend to her newfound world of motherhood. Happy balancing it
with what she calls her "moderately famous" public life, she says she always
knew she had "impossibly large shoes to fill" with her "small feet".
As
the youngest daughter of a cricket legend like Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi and
Bollywood veteran Sharmila Tagore, sister of actor Saif Ali Khan and
sister-in-law of actress Kareena Kapoor Khan, Soha often had a thought or two
about "not really being in that league but not being entirely anonymous".
In her debut book "The Perils of Being Moderately Famous", she has opened up
about it all.
"Writing a personal memoir like this was very interesting
for me as I've talked about things like working in an industry like this
(Bollywood), being compared to my mother or my brother, why I chose to get into
films, what it's like to be me, to belong to a family of superstars, not really
be in that league but not to be entirely anonymous... How people know who you
are but they really know who you are because of who you ae related to.
"It has a frustrating side to it, and then you can even laugh at it and embrace
it as an identity. I think I've tried to do the latter," Soha, a royal princess
and actress in her own right, told IANS over phone from Mumbai.
With
projects like "Khoya Khoya Chand", "Rang De Basanti", "Tum Mile" and "Saheb,
Biwi Aur Gangster Returns" in her filmography, Soha, 39, may not have been
hugely successful as an actor, but asserts she has carved her own identity.
"I think it's especially (about) living in India where fan following for
cricket and films is massive, and the fact that really both my parents have
excelled in their chosen fields.
"I'm certainly a working actor and have
lots of things going on, but I think the comparison comes in with someone like
my father and mother who have been superstars in their fields.
"My book
has a chapter 'Big Shoes, Small Feet'. For me, those shoes are impossibly large
to fill. And I do have small feet. So, beyond a point, it's not even something
you are trying to do," quipped Soha, who is confident her humorous streak will
find its fans.
She hopes her debut book, published by Penguin India, will
clear up people's misconceptions about her.
"When most people meet me,
they are surprised by who I am. I think people have a lot of pre-conceptions
about what it's like to belong to a family like mine and how it's like to have a
royal tag and be a princess, to be an actress... I thought maybe when I write
the book in a funny way, one could clear up those misconceptions."
Her
childhood, she says, was also "ordinary" -- unlike what many would like to
believe.
"I am the youngest in the family, so by the time I was born, my
mother wasn't working in films so much, my father had retired from professional
cricket. So, Amma and Appa would come for parent-teacher meetings, and my father
helped me in completing my essays for college, filled out my visa application
forms.
"We lived in Delhi, not Mumbai... So they were always ordinary
parents."
Being just that -- an ordinary parent -- herself is something
Soha is currently enjoying.
"She has woken up," Soha said of her and
husband Kunal Kemmu's daughter Inaaya Naumi Kemmu, who was born on September 29.
Returning to the call a few minutes after hanging up, Soha had a hearty
laugh over how "the baby controls everything now".
"I am such a control
freak myself, so it's really odd to be not in control of when I eat, how much I
sleep, if I can go to the gym now," she said, adding how her mind is constantly
with her little one.