Tannishtha Chatterjee has carved a niche for herself in the independent film space with her unconventional roles. After the success of ‘Angry Indian Goddesses’ where she played an activist, her role as Dhaniya in Bikas Mishra’s directorial debut ‘Chauranga’ has earned the actress unanimous critical appreciation.
The film is based on an incident that was reported on November 20, 2008, when a Dalit boy was thrown under a running train because he wrote a love letter to an upper caste girl. It has been shot in Jharkhand, Odisha and West Bengal. Tannishtha essays the role of a Dalit woman, who is the mother of protagonist Santu and uses exploitation by the upper caste community members to her own advantage, in the film that released on Friday.
Tannishtha Chaterjee
“I play the role of a woman who is non-thinking, spirited and has high ambitions for her sons. She has flavours of sweet and spice in her, which is why Bikas perhaps named her as Dhaniya,” says the talented actress, adding she might be a Dalit but Dhaniya is very contemporary in her thinking. Tannishtha stars opposite Sanjay Suri, who plays the role of an upper caste zamindar.
Having worked in several independent movies, she says preparing for the role was not very difficult. “The screenplay for the movie was very well written and Bikas being from this region of the country knew what exactly he wanted from the female lead in terms of dialect, clothes etc. Since I have seen lives of women in rural parts of the country, it was not that difficult for me to mould myself into Dhaniya’s character,” says the alumna of National School of Drama.
However, Tannishtha had to put in extra effort to convince her on-screen sons – Bajrangi and Santu (played by Riddhi Sen and Soham Maitra respectively) – that she plays their mother. Prior to making of the film, she bonded with her reel sons over Bengali food, carom sessions and holidaying at Santiniketan in West Bengal.
Tannishtha Chatterjee
Tannishtha has a number of film projects lined up for this year including Ruchika Oberoi’s Island City that had won the Fedeora Awards at 72nd Venice International Film Festival; Leena Yadav’s Parched; Amit Kumar’s Monsoon Shootout and Hollywood movie Lion where she would star opposite Nicole Kidman, Dev Patel, Deepti Naval and Nawazuddin Siddiqui.
Will she ever do a commercial movie? “I am actually dying to do a commercial movie. Hopefully, Bikas is planning to come up with a Bollywood flick featuring myself and Shahrukh Khan. But Mr Khan has to agree to do it in the first place,” she laughs.
