Home » Press & News » News » Awards work as oxygen, inclusion of best makeup artist category will encourage many: Somnath Kundu
Be it the National Film Awards or the Joy Filmfare Awards Bangla 2020 — Somnath Kundu’s name has come up as many times as Srijit Mukherji’s Gumnaami won appreciation. Srijit, along with Prosenjit Chatterjee — who won the Best Actor in a Leading Role (Male) award for Gumnaami at Filmfare Bangla — made an impassioned plea at the recently concluded ceremony for introducing a category for Best Makeup Artist as he attributed a major portion of Gumnaami’s success to Somnath. Meanwhile, far away from the spotlight, Somnath is busy in Delhi creating prosthetic makeup looks for Konkona Sen Sharma, Arjun Rampal and others for Aparna Sen’s next. In a telephonic chat, Tollywood’s ace makeup artist spoke about the need for recognition, his journey with Srijit and more. Excerpts…
Srijit and Prosenjit couldn’t stop talking about you at Filmfare as the latter bagged the Best Actor award for Gumnaami for which you created his Netaji look.
I heard. I had to give the award ceremony a miss as I am in Delhi. But I agree with them. It is the makeup artist, costume designer and hair artist who create the character visually that people watch on their screens. They might like it or hate it. These days, films are not just about song and dance sequences. Films today are content and character-driven. Hence, artists like us become indispensable to a film’s success story. You may ask, what difference an award would make? For us, awards work as oxygen, a note of encouragement and a motive to work harder. Along with me, a lot of my fellow artists also feel encouraged when one of our works gets appreciated. I don’t think it would cost our award committees much to recognise our contributions. Also, an award means putting a spotlight on us. It will make people talk about our work, and that is much needed. I am glad that Malayalam film Helen won the National Award for the Best Makeup Artist this year.
There is a dearth of prosthetic makeup artists in Tollywood, isn’t it?
For the longest time, Bengali filmmakers used to hire prosthetic makeup artists from Mumbai and there was little practice of this in Tollywood. That is the reason why I started researching it. I am a self-taught artist who learnt a lot just by reading journals. Later, online tutorials also helped. After a point, filmmakers finally started taking me seriously and I got to work with Rinadi (Aparna Sen) in Arshinagar before my journey with Srijitda began.
Tell us about your journey with Srijit.
One day, I received a call and the voice from the other end said, ‘Ami Srijit Mukherji bolchi’. When I met him, he asked me to create Jisshu U Sengupta’s look for Zulfiqar. I pepared a nose for him and added salt and pepper hair for Kashinath Kundu’s character. It was approved. I also created the look for the characters played by Nusrat Jahan and Dev. That film gave me a lot of recognition and marked the beginning of my journey with Srijitda. I went on to work with him in Yeti Obhijaan, Ek Je Chhilo Raja, Shah Jahan Regency, Vinci Da and then Gumnaami. But we have our share of tiffs too. When he approached me for Oti Uttam, I had to give it a miss since I had committed to Rinadi by then. He was not very happy about that (laughs).
Prosenjit once mentioned that it took months to finalise the look of Netaji in Gumnaami…
Bumbada did his own research for the look, even before I came on board. When I joined the team. I first sketched a look of Netaji and that got finalised. Then I sat with Bumbada for lifecasting — the first and most important step of prosthetic makeup — and started my assignment. Initially, we reached 70% of what we wanted and then, bit by bit, we achieved our goal. It took us about three months to complete the look. I must say that every actor I’ve worked with has been extremely cooperative. It is because of Bumbada’s tenacity and support that we got what we wanted. It is also true for Jisshu, Rituparna Sengupta and others.
Tell us about your upcoming projects.
I am currently shooting for Rinadi’s film in Delhi. I have done prosthetic makeup for Konkona (Sen Sharma), a wound on Arjun Rampal’s hand and some other forms of makeup. I will be back in Kolkata and start working with Arindamda (Sil) for Mahananda soon. I was part of his Maayakumari too. There are back-to-back projects at the moment, but I keep my workload light otherwise (laughs).
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