Actor-filmmaker Kunal Kemmu said that once you move beyond the bells and whistles attached to his wife Soha Ali Khan’s royal family, they’re like regular people. Soha is the daughter of Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi and Sharmila Tagore, and was raised as a royal. The family’s ancestral property, the Pataudi Palace, is now a vacation home for them. In an interview, Kunal said that even though Sharmila Tagore is a ‘begum’, she is ‘very middle-class in her values’. He also spoke about having elevated conversations with Soha’s brother, actor Saif Ali Khan, and said that much of what he sometimes says goes over his head.
Asked about Saif in an interview with Filmfare, Kunal said, “He’s so much fun. More than him being Soha’s family, he’s a friend that I have, that I really like hanging with. And he’s also no-filter sometimes… He’s also well-read and well-travelled. I don’t remember talking to him about the industry and the business. Even when we talk about films, we talk about other films.”
Recalling a humorous anecdote about one of their conversations, Kunal said, “One day, he was in the mood to talk about art, like the influence of certain artists and all that. Mereko painting painting hi lagti hai, zyaada samajh nahi aata (I look at paintings like paintings, I don’t really understand them beyond a point). I was pretending (to be interested) for an hour, because he was talking so passionately about it, but after an hour (I was nodding off). You ask me one question and I’ll give the wrong answer. But it’s nice to be in the company of people where you can learn something, right? It’s cool hanging with him, and he has a wicked sense of humour.”
Saif Ali Khan with Kunal Kemmu.
Kunal admitted that his upbringing was vastly different to that of Soha, but said that this mainly inspired curiosity in them both to learn about each other. He continued, “Culturally, Indians are pretty much the same. Amma also, Sharmila ji, she’s a begum and all of that, but she’s very middle-class in her values. When you talk to them in the isolation of the Pataudi Palace, you know them and you can converse with them. But when you take a step back, everybody’s doing ‘adaab’.”
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