Dawn Images

Alif was "godsent" for her, shares Kubra Khan, saying her character Husn e Jahan's journey mirrored much of her own

“Alif came to me at a point where I was... not in the best place. I was at a dark place in my life at that point,” revealed the actor in an interview with BBC Asian Network. “Some people may admit to it and some may not, but I think everyone goes through that point where they just don’t know what’s happening anymore.”

Kubra said despite receiving offers for work, it was at this point that she began to question herself whether she wanted to continue working in the industry. “When Alif came and I read the script, I fell in love with Husn e Jahan. I could relate to her in so many ways.”

In Alif, Kubra plays Husn e Jahan, an acclaimed actress and prolific dancer of a bygone golden era who suddenly dropped everything to marry the man she loved and moved to Turkey.

Though she left everything — work, family, country — for a man, Kubra qualifies that Husn e Jahan’s love for him stems from his love of God. “It’s love for a human, sure, but that human stands for something else, something more than that for Husn e Jahan. The reason she fell in love with him is because of the love he had for Allah, and the spirituality he carried with him. She fell in love with that because she had never experienced that before.”

“The way she started connecting with herself and with Allah was something she had never even thought about before. When she comes back [to Pakistan] and she’s dancing again — she’s dancing again, but her soul is dead.”

“Husn e Jahan is in the entertainment industry, but nobody knows what’s her core. I’m in the entertainment industry too, but nobody knows my core either. I’m [known as] that person who has an item song — but nobody knows what I do at home or that I pray or have a connection with Allah."

“I feel like that’s a misconception that our people have, that just because you’re in the industry, you have to be corrupt. That’s not true. I know so many amazing people in the industry who have found their core.”

“I didn’t act Husn e Jahan; I think I lived Husn e Jahan. She changed my life so much that I really became engrossed into it.”

“In my scenes with Pehlaj [Hassan, who plays the younger version of Hamza Ali Abbasi’s Qalb e Momin], I felt like a mother to him. He almost fell out of a tree out of scene and me and his mother both ran towards him because I felt so connected to her. Anything she was going through, I felt I was.”

“It was hard but when I put myself in her shoes, it was just me.”

In characteristic understatement, Kubra also expressed she's "a little disappointed" with Khalil Ur Rehman Qamar's recent comments about women and feminism.

The two are working together on London Nahi Jaunga.

"Khalil Ur Rehman Qamar is such a talented writer, he writes like a dream. I have loved his work in the past, but I am a little disappointed."

"Maybe it’s misinterpreted, but it doesn't take away from the fact that he said what he said. I expected better from him, I would think he would've known better not to say stuff like that — but he did."

Kubra added that the film is going to be "judged or misjudged" due to his comments though it has only been announced, but holds out hope that Khalil will address the issue so it doesn't colour the film's reception. "I hope he clears it up; it’s something that should not have been said; there are certain boundaries you do not cross."