Konkona Sen Sharma feels putting onus of balancing work and family on women is normalised: 'I have also dealt with it'

Konkona Sen Sharma talks about work-life balance and more in an unfiltered chat for her new show, Search: The Naina Murder Case.

Konkona Sen Sharma was recently seen in Search: The Naina Murder Case, the new JioHotstar show that sees her play a police officer trying to balance work and family. In a chat with Hindustan Times, Konkona discusses how the character was relatable, the changing world for female actors, and more.

Konkona Sen Sharma talks about work-life balance and more.

On balancing work and family

In Search, Konkona plays ACP Sanyukta, a homicide investigator who is also grappling with being a mother to a teenager, while trying to rebuild her marriage. The show subtly touches upon how, sometimes, the onus of balancing work and family is more on the woman than the man. Konkona agrees, “It’s very normalised in a way. That aspect of it is something that I have also dealt with for many years – the balance of handling things at home and at work. In fact, I found playing Sanyukta quite liberating because she was just not handling things at home.”

The actor says that trying to find that balance is an ongoing process, something she is still trying to master. “On a good day, I feel I have a rich and fulfilling life with so many aspects to it that even if one is a little down, one can look at the other one. But on some days, I do feel ‘I don’t know how I am going to manage this’. Sometimes you fail, or on other days you succeed, or maybe fail less. That’s a nice way of putting it,” she says with a laugh.

On roles for women over 40

At 45, Konkona is leading shows on streaming, something the OTT platform has enabled for female actors of her generation. “I am very pleasantly surprised by this, and also that the characters I am playing don’t require me to pretend to be much younger. A lot of men and women were doing that in the big theatrical films a few years ago,” she says. She agrees that the goalposts are shifting from ‘women over 30’ to ‘women over 40’, but says there is still some way to go. “You always say women above 40, never above 50. Even if you are above 50, you say you are above 40. That’s a neat trick,” says Konkona with a laugh, “But we’ll get there.”

Produced by Applause Entertainment and Highgate Entertainment, and directed by Rohan Sippy, Search: The Naina Murder Case is currently streaming on JioHotstar.