With her unconventional screen presence Kalki Koechlin is surely in demand. She has two interesting projects - Ek Thi Daayan and Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani - in her kitty. Sreya Basu chats up with the actress in Mumbai

You are playing a witch in your upcoming supernatural film Ek Thi Daayan. In real life, how scared your husband, filmmaker Anurag Kashyap is of you?
He tries to pretend to be scared of me ... he is not that afraid of me. But he acts a little to make me feel powerful.

Tell us more about the film.
Well, Ek Thi Daayan is a scary film about a witch, obviously, and a magician (Emraan Hashmi). Mystery is, there are three possible witches in the film - me, Konkona Sen Sharma and Huma Qureshi. The audience will be left guessing who the daayan is; the film has an original story. It's a special film for me as I have not done a horror film before.

You are working with Emraan for the second time.
Yes I have worked with him in Shanghai (2012) already. He is fantastic. He is very professional. We are good friends and we get along very well.


You will be lip-syncing for the first time in you career in Ek Thi Daayan?
Ya. So far, all my songs have been played on the background. The song is called Yaaram. You will see my playing the guitar along with lip-syncing. The track also features Emraan.

You are also working with Ranbir Kapoor in Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani. How was the experience?
The film is a lot of fun, we are still shooting. We will also shoot in Kashmir. Ranbir is good when he is at his best behavior. I don't know what he puts in his breakfast, he has too much energy on the set.

Do you have any plans to direct a film like Anurag?
Not at the moment. I prefer to be in front of the camera.


Unlike your contemporaries in Bollywood, we hardly see you endorse a product. Why?
I just can't do random endorsements. I need to be familiar with the brand. I need to know their past. Like, I endorse Nokia Lumia ... I know the Nokia people since I have worked with them as a student. I know all about Nokia phones, I know you can throw a Nokia phone on the floor and still it will work.

I know this because I used to drop my phone every now and then ... it used to break apart and then again come together. Most of the phones I had so far are Nokia, so I am familiar with the brand, which is very important when it comes to endorsing one.

Having worked with prominent names of the industry, is there an actor with whom you really want to share screen?
I am a very greedy actor and want to work with everyone. Still if you ask me, I would like to work with Nawaz (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) as I respect him as an actor. He is one of the new actors I find to be very, very talented.


Do you mind being part of a multi-starrer or playing second fiddle to the hero?
As long as the film does well nothing else matters. It's the most important thing.