Soha Ali Khan has an undeniable charm on screen that I have always admired. She livens up the screen whenever she comes on to it, and I had been missing that presence for a while now. So naturally, when Soha returned to the screens with Kaun Banegi Shikharwati (KBS), I was extremely excited and even the actress resonates with that feeling.
In the show, Soha plays sister to Lara Dutta Bhupathi, Anya Singh and Kritika Kamra’s characters and as she tells me, being surrounded by so many powerful and talented women is what she loved the most about working on the project.
Soha says,
“There is a lot I admire about Lara, Anya and Kritika and also the other women involved in the project, including Ananya Banerjee, the writer and co-director of the show. She is so naturally funny and gifted and brought so much to our characters. Going back to work after such a long period, I was apprehensive. But a lot of those apprehensions were dispelled with, once I met the cast.”
KBS is a show about a royal family and in real life, Soha does have royal roots. So, I wondered if she found a connection on that level with the story and the show, and to that, the actress has a quirky answer.
She quips,
“I have been saying that I was the princess consultant and they got me for free, to teach my on screen sisters on how to be princesses and help them with some heirs and graces that only a true blood would do apparently. But jokes apart, when we were doing certain scenes and characters, my director Gauravv Chawla would come up to me and say that they were inspired from my real family. He has worked with my brother before and has also been to our home many times, including our ancestral home in Pataudi. He has met a lot of our caretakers and extended family, and he has taken inspiration from a lot of them for the show.”
During the shoot of the show, Soha was accompanied by her daughter Inaya and she became the apple of everyone’s eyes there, with all of them trying to play with her and spend time with her. Even though Anya plays Soha’s sister in the show, off screen, Anya behaved more like a sister to Inaya.
Soha shares,
“Anya and Inaya would actually fight and you would have to tear them apart.”
Doing a show on sibling rivalry must have brought back memories for Soha since she has a brother and a sister—Saif Ali Khan and Saba Ali Khan—in real life. As I mention that to her, the actress goes down memory lane.
Soha recalls,
“I seem to have a food insecurity in my life and I don’t know where it comes from. Even as a child, when I would go to parties and get some sweets, I would eat all of mine the same night whereas my sister would hoard them for weeks and eventually I would steal them.”
It was a breath of fresh air to see Soha back on screen once again and after getting the taste of it, I just wish for it to happen more now. The actress is a dynamite on screen and I am now just waiting for her next announcement to happen.