The bold and the beautiful

In her new book, which she calls not quite a memoir, actor Kubbra Sait bares it all

- Ananya Ghosh

Kubbra Sait's realistic and nuanced portrayal of Kukoo, the transgender woman who becomes Nawazuddin Siddiqui's love interest, in the first season of Sacred Games, marked the arrival of a powerhouse performer. Not only did she play the role to perfection, often prompting people to actually Google her actual gender, but she also had a frontal nudity scenean audacious decision which promptly earned her the sobriquet of bold'.

But while stripping off your clothes in front of the camera takes guts, baring your soul to the public needs real valour. And Kubbra has now done just that in her latest release, Open Book: Not Quite A Memoir. People who have been following her autobiographical sketches for Kommune India are already aware of her penchant for storytelling, replete with stark and brutally honest monologues.

"I AM NOT AFRAID TO FAIL AND I AM ALSO THE PERSON WHO DOESN'T LIVE WAITING FOR DESIRABLE OUTCOMES" -KUBBRA SAIT, ACTOR & AUTHOR

Now, her tales are open to others.

"Always tell a story when you are over it... that is the greatest advice I got as a storyteller from my mentors at Kommune. I was really not re-living any of these stories. I was only sharing, with an updated, aligned perspective. I was done with the proximity to the subjects I spoke about," she says.

What made the 38-year-old actor decide to write (not quite) a memoir?

"I don't know if I should worry about how old I am or how young I feel," she says, adding that she is a person who runs with gut feeling and intuition. "This pandemic was a full-blown full stop in all our lives. I felt pangs of insecurity; I also experienced fear about mortality. Not many thought we'd make it through without a fight or the will to live. I wanted to live past my past."

The catharsis