Sumukhi Suresh can’t keep calm. Not that she wants to. The stand-up comedian is currently touring across the country with her show Hoemonal, which she kicked off in Europe.
Just a couple of months ago, she wrote dialogues for Vikramaditya Motwane’s Netflix screen-life thriller CTRL. And soon, she’ll be seen acting in Netflix show The Royals. Juggling three hats demands a lot of agility, but not when you’re Sumukhi, who can dump all three hats in a big hat and wear it like a boss.
No juggling, only hustling
“Honestly, I like to do all three, and if I get a chance, maybe more. I’m that artist who has to do everything to be a good artist. I find it easier to have a range in what I do,” says Sumukhi in an exclusive interview. She also feels the three inform each other tremendously. For instance, while she could use her improv skills to make her Royals character her own, she was wary of not trampling on the writing. “I’m a writer myself so I don’t want to disturb their framework, something they’ve created so painstakingly,” she adds.
With The Royals, Sumukhi returns to acting three years after Hum Do Teen Chaar, her Amazon MiniTV show with fellow comic Biswa Kalyan Rath. The writer and the stand-up comedian had taken forefront ever since she started her content house Motormouth Writers, which specialises in telling stories of ‘villain-ish’ women. But with her joining Dharma Cornerstone Agency, she feels acting would soon cease to be on the backseat. “I don’t think it’s as much backseat as much as honestly, the opportunities. I want to do everything, which is great, but I can alone not manage everything, right? The right managing of it is giving me the opportunity to explore everything to its fullest,” Sumukhi stresses.
Hoemonal imbalance
The only thing that Sumukhi isn’t being able to balance, of all the things she slays, is her hormones. “When I turned 30, I was asked to dial down on dating like most women in India, but we want to explore that side. It’s very tough for girls to date in their 30s because the ‘options’ are ‘reduced’,” Sumukhi says. But she’s using all the imbalance and ‘misfortunes’ as ammunition for her Hoemonal tour, the next stop of which is in Mumbai on December 7. “The writing is satricial and personal, and eventually, hopefully, sombre. ‘Hoemonal’ because I’m failing at being a ‘hoe’ while managing my hormonal issues,” she adds.