Kalki Koechlin

Kalki Koechlin (born 10 January 1984) is a French actress and writer who works in Hindi films.

Known for her unconventional body of work, she is the recipient of several accolades including a National Film Award, a Filmfare Award, and two Screen Awards.

Although a French citizen, she has been raised and lived most of her life in India.

Born in Pondicherry, India, Koechlin was drawn to theatre from a young age.

She studied drama at Goldsmiths, University of London, and worked simultaneously with a local theatre company.

Kalki Koechlin was born in Pondicherry, India, on 10 January 1984 to French parents, Joël Koechlin and Françoise Armandie, who came to India from Angers, France, after adopting Hinduism.

She is a descendant of Maurice Koechlin, a French structural engineer who played an important role in the design and construction of the Eiffel Tower.

Koechlin's parents are devotees of Sri Aurobindo, and she spent a significant amount of her early childhood in Auroville.

The family later settled in Kallatty, a village near Ooty, Tamil Nadu, where Koechlin's father established a business designing hang-gliders and ultralight aircraft.

Koechlin was brought up in a strict environment in Ooty where she spoke English, Tamil, and French.

Her parents divorced when she was fifteen; her father moved to Bangalore and remarried, while Koechlin continued living with her mother.

She has described the time that she spent at Kallatty between the ages of 5 and 8, before her parents' divorce, as her "happiest".

Koechlin has a half-brother from her mother's previous marriage, and a half-brother from her father's subsequent marriage.

Koechlin studied at Hebron School, a boarding school in Ooty, where she was involved in acting and writing.

She has admitted to being shy and quiet as a child.

Koechlin aspired to study psychiatry and become a criminal psychologist.

After completing her schooling at the age of 18, she moved to London and studied drama and theatre at Goldsmiths, University of London.

There, she worked for two years with the theatre company Theatre of Relativity, writing The Rise of the Wild Hunt and performing in plays such as David Hare's The Blue Room and Marivaux's The Dispute.

She worked as a waitress on weekends.

After completing her studies, Koechlin moved back to India and lived with her maternal half-brother in Bangalore.

Unable to find work there, she moved to Mumbai, where she worked with theatre directors and with Atul Kumar and Ajay Krishnan, the founders of a Mumbai-based theatre company called "The Company Theatre".

They were looking for actors for a theatrical festival, Contacting the World, to be held in Liverpool.

After returning to India, she made her Hindi film debut as Chanda in the black comedy-drama Dev.D (2009), winning the Filmfare Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance.

She co-wrote the drama Skeleton Woman (2009), which won her The MetroPlus Playwright Award, and made her directorial debut on stage with the tragicomedy Living Room (2015).

Koechlin is also an activist and promotes various causes ranging from health and education to women empowerment and gender equality.

After moving to Mumbai, Koechlin auditioned for Anurag Kashyap's black comedy-drama Dev.D (2009), a modern-day adaptation of Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay's 1917 Bengali novel Devdas.

Starring alongside Abhay Deol and Mahie Gill, Koechlin plays the role of Leni / Chanda, a young woman who turns to prostitution after a leaked sex tape scandal.

The character was based on Chandramukhi, a pivotal character in the novel, a prostitute who fell in love with the titular character.

Kashyap initially rejected Koechlin as she was not Indian, and did not match his visualisation of the character, but he changed his mind and offered her the role after seeing her audition tape.

The film opened to positive reviews from critics upon release, with particular praise for Koechlin's performance, which was described as "imbued [...] with a touching fragility" and "astonishingly [appropriate]".

Critics were more impressed by her character's complexity, but thought of Koechlin's performance in the film's first half as "amateurish".

Moreover, it emerged as a commercial success at the box-office, earning ₹208 million worldwide.

Koechlin's performance in the film earned her the Filmfare Award for Best Supporting Actress.

Koechlin made a transition to web content in the late 2010s, starring in a spate of successful web series.

Subsequently, she starred in two of the highest-grossing Hindi films of their respective release years, the romantic comedy-dramas Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara (2011) and Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani (2013), both of which garnered her nominations for the Filmfare Award for Best Supporting Actress.

Koechlin expanded her career into screenwriting with the crime thriller That Girl in Yellow Boots (2011), in which she also played the lead role.

Koechlin's commercial success continued with the supernatural thriller Ek Thi Daayan (2013) and the musical drama Gully Boy (2019), while also receiving critical praise for her performances in independent films, including the comedy-drama Waiting (2015) and the slice-of-life film Ribbon (2017).

She earned high acclaim and the National Film Award – Special Jury Award for her role of a young woman with cerebral palsy in the coming-of-age drama Margarita with a Straw (2014).

She drew particular praise for her portrayal of a lonely socialite in Amazon Prime Video's romantic drama Made in Heaven and a self-styled godwoman in Netflix's crime thriller Sacred Games (both 2019).

Koechlin has written, produced, and acted in several stage productions.