Tannishtha Chatterjee on juggling Hollywood, Bollywood: 'Love being able to co-exist in both'

It’s a shoulder injury that has kept Tannishtha Chatterjee down for almost a week now. The excruciating pain is just not allowing her to sleep. The injury has also forced her to postpone the Kashmir schedule of her upcoming film by another week but being a true professional, it has not deterred her from promoting her film Monsoon Shootout from the confines of her home. So what is the reason behind this much-delayed release? “I have no idea as far as the production and distribution are concerned. That’s a very tough ball especially when you chose to produce a film like this. Monsoon Shootout was premiered at the Grand Auditorium Louis Lumière in the official selection at Cannes in 2013 and very few films make it to the cut. I think Guneet, the producer would be better equipped to answer this,” clarifies Tannishtha. [caption id=“attachment_4273421” align=“alignnone” width=“1280”] Tannishtha Chatterjee and Nawazuddin Siddiqui in a still from Monsoon Shootout. YouTube[/caption] With such films, one question that constantly lingers in one’s mind is that despite the accolades and laurels they get at international platforms, the reception is far from satisfactory when they hit domestic shores. Tannishtha squarely puts the blame on nature of such films. “It’s very difficult to release such films. I had done a film called Island City  a few years ago and that film had won the debut director award at the Venice Film Festival but when it released in India, it was screened in just three cities.” Tannishtha also chips in that winning an award at the Venice Film Festival is truly a big deal and in any other country, it would have been a national prestige. “Arts and culture have taken a backseat in our country. We don’t value arts and we don’t value basic things be it food, water, air or even farmers. It’s tough for such films.” In Monsoon Shootout, Tannishtha plays the wife of Nawazuddin Siddiqui, a gangster in the film. As far as reference for such a film is concerned, she mentions that Krzysztof Kieślowski’s Blind Chance comes close to the format. “Before the shoot, I even asked Amit Kumar if he has seen the film considering the fact that he is an alumni of FTII but he was not aware of it.” In a career spanning 14 years, Tannishtha is one of the few actresses who have successfully maintained a balance between domestic and international films. So what gives her more satisfaction? “I actually love the idea of being able to co-exist in both the world. After I finished my portion for the multimillion-dollar costume drama, Anna Karenina, and landed in Mumbai, the very next day I was transported to the dingy lanes of Mumbai to shoot for Monsoon Shootout. This extreme is something that I really enjoy and it’s wonderful.” Her international exposure has also given her opportunities to prove her mettle in the company of stars like Jude Law, Kiera Knightley and Martin Sheen. She has fond memories of Anna Karenina and informs that she shared rooms with Alicia Vikander who was making her debut and eventually went on to win an Oscar three years later for her stunning performance in The Danish Girl. She also recalls the moment when she met Jude Law for the first time and it almost became a scoop for an Indian newspaper. “It was at the Toronto Film Festival when I met Jude for the first time when I was there with Brick Lane. We both met a party and later I saw front-page news in the Times of India linking us both. Someone even asked me if I asked him or he asked? A few years later when I met him on the sets of Anna Karenina, he remembered that picture and blamed me for leaking it. I said that I did not do it and he should have read that article carefully. I informed him that Indian media works in a different way. I also told him that this time I am not taking any pictures with him so while I have images with all the actors there are none with Jude.” Bollywood has also been picky in giving opportunities to this dusky talent and the reply that she gives is smeared with the problem that is currently plaguing Hollywood. “I don’t really belong to a lobby and have never allowed people to crawl over me as I come from a different background. I will not allow certain kind of things to happen to me, which might happen to others.” The uncomfortable situations compelled Tannishtha to move to another bunch of casting directors who specialize in international films and thus, managed films like Brick Lane and Shadows of Time. “The first time I encountered a bit of creepy crawliness, I just switched off and I stopped meeting people for work. It was not a pleasant experience. Maybe I did lose out on opportunities but after that, I started meeting people like Uma Da Cunha, Loveleen Tandon and Dilip Shankar, and entered a circuit where there was neither nepotism nor creepy crawliness.” Tannishtha was also in news last year when she was mocked by a comedy show because of the color of her skin. Have things changed after that? “How can things change so soon? We are raising our voice as women all the time. The color perception is not going to change overnight. Have the ads of any fairness creams stopped? We have to constantly be at it for many years to witness any change,” says a determined Tannishtha.