Sushant Divgikr is the latest name attached to the upcoming podcast series on Audible, Marvel’s Wastelanders: Star-Lord. They join Saif Ali Khan who plays Peter Quill and Vrajesh Hirjee who plays Rocket. In an interview with Hindustan Times, they spoke about the audio series, their character and its importance in the Marvel universe, and what needs to change for queer representation in Indian media. Also read: Kareena Kapoor and Masaba Gupta team up for Marvel’s Wastelanders: Black Widow
The performer, who is also known as Rani KoHEnur, is a veteran in the arena, having recorded for many series since Audible was first launched in India. When they were contacted for the Marvel series, however, Sushant thought it was spam at first. They shared, “I clicked [the mail] and then I realised, ‘Oh god, this is serious?’ Then I sent it to my agency and they verified it. When they called back, I died screaming. I’m going to be in the Marvel Universe, it’s beyond me. Before I got this offer, I had auditioned for something else. But I got this. I’m glad I didn’t get that because that would clash with this.”
In the podcast series, Sushant plays Cora, a Rigellian Recorder who is part of the Guardians of the Galaxy crew after they land in a post-apocalyptic dystopian future where the Avengers are all but vanquished by the Super Villains.
Sushant revealed about their character, “The best part about [the series] is that Cora is not human. She’s an artificial intelligence recording machine. The fact that it’s a genderfluid character in the universe, I thought it was very beautiful that they got me to voice it, because I’m neither male nor female so I don’t fit in the binary. Cora is in charge of making notes and having every move recorded, so she automatically becomes a very pivotal character. She is also very objective, she never takes sides.”
There are several big names attached to the six-part audio series which follows other Marvel characters like Wolverine, Hawkeye and Black Widow. They include Kareena Kapoor, Jaideep Ahlawat, Sharad Kelkar, Ashish Vidhyarthi, Masaba Gupta, Mithila Palkar, Prajakta Koli, Yashaswini Dayama and Anangsha Biswas. But the artistes all didn’t get spend much time recording together as a few had to end up doing their parts separately
“Some of us met, some of us didn’t meet. Some of us knew each other so it was easy to kind of also record with them. There are certain people I have maximum scenes with that I could not meet even once, I feel bad about that but also [due to] timings and schedules,” Sushant explained.
They really want to meet up with Kareena at some point and weren’t even aware till recently that she was part of the project as well. “Kareena, I love since I can remember, since Refugee (2000). I did not know that Kareena is in the picture because she’s actually part of the series. I thought she’d come to cheer [Saif] on,” Sushant said, adding that they hope to meet up with Kareena eventually.
Sushant grew up consuming Marvel content via their brothers growing up but eventually became interested in the comics and film universe too. “When your older siblings are doing something, you’re very intrigued. That’s how I got interested, but then once I did, there was no turning back. Then I became a geek,” they said.
When asked about favourite superheroes, Sushant named a few. They replied, “I actually love Black Panther, in fact, all the characters in Black Panther, whether they are antagonists or protagonists. Recently, if you ask me, I also like Ms Marvel. I love her. Among the antagonists, I would say Thanos is my favourite. After this, I think Cora is also pretty good.”
Recently, Sushant won a Bloggers Award for LGBTQIA+ Voice of the year. It was a meaningful moment for them, especially since it occurred on the International Day of Transgender Visibility. After winning, Sushant called the other nominees on stage to receive the award with them, as they felt each and every voice is important.
Speaking about the honour, they explained, “In my category, all the other nominees were cisgender men and for me, I have seen that journey even as a cisgendered man, when I thought and identified because of peer pressure. I’ve done TV shows and so many things as a boy. When I realised that I’m not, it actually empowered me, but of course, it was very difficult for me to come out because people are used to seeing me in a certain way and light in the public domain.”
They continued, “I can’t play a character at home. If I look at myself in a mirror and I don’t like what I see. That is the biggest disservice I am doing to my authenticity and also about me being alive, my very essence as a person. I do think that awards like this remind me that what I’m doing by being myself is what happens to an entire generation of transgender kids or queer children who get empowered.”
This is already shaping up to be a momentous year for Sushant. They will be making their film debut soon and also have a web series lined up. Sushant also teased that their playback singing debut is also happening. The long journey to the mainstream hasn’t been easy.
But elaborating on queer representation in Indian media, Sushant felt there is still much work to be done. They shared that from a creative perspective, the narrative of queer characters in scripts was changing, but not on screen.
They said, “What I don’t see changing is the representation physically of the artistes representing the character. It’s a very dichotomous situation. What is praiseworthy, you praise. What needs to be called out and not because I have anything against the artiste. But if you’re making roles, you’re specifically making roles for transgender people and you are not giving it to transgender people, it is as absurd as Shah Rukh Khan playing your biopic. Or Priyanka Chopra playing Shah Rukh’s biopic.”
“There are certain schools of thought that will say, ‘Arre, but woh to artiste hain na, artiste to kuch bhi kar sakta hai (They are artistes. They can do anything).’ To phir hum bhi to artiste hain, humko bhi do, hum bhi karenge (Then we are also artiste, we can also do).’ According to that mindset, I think it should be an equal playing ground for every artiste,” they concluded.
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