Netflix's Laapataa Ladies' Manju Mai aka Chhaya Kadam makes her Cannes debut, wears late mother's saree & nath

Actress Chhaya Kadam, who garnered praises for her recent portrayals of Manju Mai in Laapataa Ladies and Kanchan Kombdi in _Madgaon Expres_s, made her debut at the Cannes Film Festival 2024 for her Malayalam film ‘All We Imagine As Light’.

The Payal Kapadia directorial was the first Indian film to compete in the main category (Palme d’Or) of Cannes in the last 30 years.

Sharing her pics from the French Riviera on Instagram, she mentioned that it was her dream to take her mother on a flight but couldn’t while she was alive but now she did symbolically by wearing her saree and Nath as her Cannes look.

Her note in Marathi roughly translates into, “My dream of taking you on a flight remained unfulfilled….but today I am content that I brought your saree and nose ring to the Cannes Film Festival by flight. Still mom! You were needed today. To see it all. Love you Mom, and miss you very much.”

The Jhund actress also shared a pic with the music maestro AR Rahman, with whom she interacted at the festival.

Talking about All We Imagine As Light, it is produced by France’s Petit Chaos along with co-producers including India’s Chalk & Cheese, France’s Arte France Cinema, the Netherlands’ Baldr Film, India’s Another Birth, Luxembourg’s Les Films Fauves and Italy’s Pulpa Film. It features Kani Kusruti, Divya Prabha and Hridhu Haroon in key roles.

Payal Kapadia, who is an alumna of the Film & Television Institute of India (FTII), is best known for her acclaimed documentary “A Night of Knowing Nothing”, which premiered at the 2021  Cannes Film Festival  ’s Director’s Fortnight side-bar and won the Oeil d’or (Golden Eye) award.